"Peters, Ellis - Brother Cadfael 10 - Pilgrim of Hate, The" - читать интересную книгу автора (Peters Ellis)The Pilgrim of Hate In the year of our Lord 1141, civil war over England’s throne
leaves a legacy of violence—and the murder of a knight dear to Brother Cadfael.
And with gentle bud-strewn May, a flood of pilgrims comes to the celebration of
Saint Winifred at the Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, carrying with it
many strange souls and perhaps the knight’s killer. Brother Cadfael’s shrewd
eyes see all: the prosperous merchant who rings false, an angelic lame boy, his
beautiful dowerless sister, and two wealthy penitents. In the name of justice
Cadfael decides to uncover the strange and twisted tale that accompanies these
travelers. Instead he unearths a quest for vengeance, witnesses a miracle, and
finds himself on a razor’s edge between death or the absolution of love. The Tenth Chronicle of Brother Cadfael,
of the Benedictine Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, at Shrewsbury By Ellis PetersChapter One THEY WERE TOGETHER in Brother Cadfael’s
hut in the herbarium, in the afternoon of the twenty-fifth day of May, and the
talk was of high matters of state, of kings and empresses, and the unbalanced
fortunes that plagued the irreconcilable contenders for thrones. “Well, the lady is not crowned yet!” said
Hugh Beringar, almost as firmly as if he saw a way of preventing it. “She is not even in London yet,” agreed
Cadfael, stirring carefully round the pot embedded in the coals of his brazier,
to keep the brew from boiling up against the sides and burning. “She cannot
well be crowned until they let her in to Westminster. Which it seems, from all
I gather, they are in no hurry to do.” “Where the sun shines,” said Hugh
ruefully, “there whoever’s felt the cold will gather. My cause, old friend, is
out of the sun. When Henry of Blois shifts, all men shift with him, like
starvelings huddled in one bed. He heaves the coverlet, and they go with him,
clinging by the hems.” “Not all,” objected Cadfael, briefly
smiling as he stirred. “Not you. Do you think you are the only one?” “God forbid!” said Hugh, and suddenly
laughed, shaking off his gloom. He came back from the open doorway, where the
pure light spread a soft golden sheen over the bushes and beds of the
herb-garden and the moist noon air drew up a heady languor of spiced and
drunken odours, and plumped his slender person down again on the bench against
the timber wall, spreading his booted feet on the earth floor. A small man in
one sense only, and even so trimly made. His modest stature and light weight
had deceived many a man to his undoing. The sunshine from without, fretted by
the breeze that swayed the bushes, was reflected from one of Cadfael’s great
glass flagons to illuminate by flashing glimpses a lean, tanned face, clean
shaven, with a quirky mouth, and agile black eyebrows that could twist upward
sceptically into cropped black hair. A face at once eloquent and inscrutable.
Brother Cadfael was one of the few who knew how to read it. Doubtful if even
Hugh’s wife Aline understood him better. Cadfael was in his sixty-second year,
and Hugh still a year or two short of thirty but, meeting thus in easy
companionship in Cadfael’s workshop among the herbs, they felt themselves
contemporaries. “No,” said Hugh, eyeing circumstances
narrowly, and taking some cautious comfort, “not all. There are a few of us
yet, and not so badly placed to hold on to what we have. There’s the queen in
Kent with her army. Robert of Gloucester is not going to turn his back to come
hunting us here while she hangs on the southern fringes of London. And with the
Welsh of Gwynedd keeping our backs against the earl of Chester, we can hold
this shire for King Stephen and wait out the time. Luck that turned once can
turn again. And the empress is not queen of England yet.” But for all that, thought Cadfael, mutely
stirring his brew for Brother Aylwin’s scouring calves, it began to look as
though she very soon would be. Three years of civil war between cousins
fighting for the sovereignty of England had done nothing to reconcile the
factions, but much to sicken the general populace with insecurity, rapine and
killing. The craftsman in the town, the cottar in the village, the serf on the
demesne, would be only too glad of any monarch who could guarantee him a quiet
and orderly country in which to carry on his modest business. But to a man like
Hugh it was no such indifferent matter. He was King Stephen’s liege man, and
now King Stephen’s sheriff of Shropshire, sworn to hold the shire for his
cause. And his king was a prisoner in Bristol castle since the lost battle of
Lincoln. A single February day of this year had seen a total reversal of the
fortunes of the two claimants to the throne. The Empress Maud was up in the
clouds, and Stephen, crowned and anointed though he might be, was down in the
midden, close-bound and close-guarded, and his brother Henry of Blois, bishop
of Winchester and papal legate, far the most influential of the magnates and
hitherto his brother’s supporter, had found himself in a dilemma. He could
either be a hero, and adhere loudly and firmly to his allegiance, thus
incurring the formidable animosity of a lady who was in the ascendant and could
be dangerous, or trim his sails and accommodate himself to the reverses of
fortune by coming over to her side. Discreetly, of course, and with
well-prepared arguments to render his about-face respectable. It was just
possible, thought Cadfael, willing to do justice even to bishops, that Henry
also had the cause of order and peace genuinely at heart, and was willing to
back whichever contender could restore them. “What frets me,” said Hugh restlessly, “is
that I can get no reliable news. Rumours enough and more than enough, every new
one laying the last one dead, but nothing a man can grasp and put his trust in.
I shall be main glad when Abbot Radulfus comes home.” “So will every brother in this house,”
agreed Cadfael fervently. “Barring Jerome, perhaps, he’s in high feather when
Prior Robert is left in charge, and a fine time he’s had of it all these weeks
since the abbot was summoned to Winchester. But Robert’s rule is less favoured
by the rest of us, I can tell you.” “How long is it he’s been away now?”
pondered Hugh. “Seven or eight weeks! The legate’s keeping his court well
stocked with mitres all this time. Maintaining his own state no doubt gives him
some aid in confronting hers. Not a man to let his dignity bow to princes,
Henry, and he needs all the weight he can get at his back.” “He’s letting some of his cloth disperse
now, however,” said Cadfael. “By that token, he may have got a kind of
settlement. Or he may be deceived into thinking he has. Father Abbot sent word
from Reading. In a week he should be here. You’ll hardly find a better
witness.” Bishop Henry had taken good care to keep
the direction of events in his own hands. Calling all the prelates and mitred
abbots to Winchester early in April, and firmly declaring the gathering a
legatine council, no mere church assembly, had ensured his supremacy at the
subsequent discussions, giving him precedence over Archbishop Theobald of
Canterbury, who in purely English church matters was his superior. Just as
well, perhaps. Cadfael doubted if Theobald had greatly minded being outflanked.
In the circumstances a quiet, timorous man might be only too glad to lurk
peaceably in the shadows, and let the legate bear the heat of the sun. “I know it. Once let me hear his account
of what’s gone forward, down there in the south, and I can make my own
dispositions. We’re remote enough here, and the queen, God keep her, has
gathered a very fair array, now she has the Flemings who escaped from Lincoln
to add to her force. She’ll move heaven and earth to get Stephen out of hold,
by whatever means, fair or foul. She is,” said Hugh with conviction, “a better
soldier than her lord. Not a better fighter in the field, God knows you’d need
to search Europe through to find such a one, I saw him at Lincoln, a marvel!
But a better general, that she is. She holds to her purpose, where he tires and
goes off after another quarry. They tell me, and I believe it, she’s drawing
her cordon closer and closer to London, south of the river. The nearer her
rival comes to Westminster, the tighter that noose will be drawn.” “And is it certain the Londoners have
agreed to let the empress in? We hear they came late to the council, and made a
faint plea for Stephen before they let themselves be tamed. It takes a very
stout heart, I suppose, to stand up to Henry of Winchester face to face, and
deny him,” allowed Cadfael, sighing. “They’ve agreed to admit her, which is as
good as acknowledging her. But they’re arguing terms for her entry, as I heard
it, and every delay is worth gold to me and to Stephen. If only,” said Hugh,
the dancing light suddenly sharpening every line of his intent and eloquent
face, “if only I could get a good man into Bristol! There are ways into
castles, even into the dungeons. Two or three good, secret men might do it. A
fistful of gold to a malcontent gaoler… Kings have been fetched off before now,
even out of chains, and he’s not chained. She has not gone so far, not yet.
Cadfael, I dream! My work is here, and I am but barely equal to it. I have no
means of carrying off Bristol, too.” “Once loosed,” said Cadfael, “your king is
going to need this shire ready to his hand.” He turned from the brazier, hoisting aside
the pot and laying it to cool on a slab of stone he kept for the purpose. His
back creaked a little as he straightened it. In small ways he was feeling his
years, but once erect he was spry enough. “I’m done here for this while,” he said,
brushing his hands together to get rid of the hollow worn by the ladle. “Come
into the daylight, and see the flowers we’re bringing on for the festival of
Saint Winifred. Father Abbot will be home in good time to preside over her
reception from Saint Giles. And we shall have a houseful of pilgrims to care
for.” They had brought the reliquary of the
Welsh saint four years previously from Gwytherin, where she lay buried, and
installed it on the altar of the church at the hospital of Saint Giles, at the
very edge of Shrewsbury’s Foregate suburb, where the sick, the infected, the
deformed, the lepers, who might not venture within the walls, were housed and
cared for. And thence they had borne her casket in splendour to her altar in
the abbey church, to be an ornament and a wonder, a means of healing and blessing
to all who came reverently and in need. This year they had undertaken to repeat
that last journey, to bring her from Saint Giles in procession, and open her
altar to all who came with prayers and offerings. Every year she had drawn many
pilgrims. This year they would be legion. “A man might wonder,” said Hugh, standing
spread-footed among the flower beds just beginning to burn from the soft, shy
colours of spring into the blaze of summer, “whether you were not rather
preparing for a bridal.” Hedges of hazel and may-blossom shed
silver petals and dangled pale, silver-green catkins round the enclosure where
they stood, cowslips were rearing in the grass of the meadow beyond, and irises
were in tight, thrusting bud. Even the roses showed a harvest of buds, erect
and ready to break and display the first colour. In the walled shelter of
Cadfael’s herb-garden there were fat globes of peonies, too, just cracking
their green sheaths. Cadfael had medicinal uses for the seeds, and Brother
Petrus, the abbot’s cook, used them as spices in the kitchen. “A man might not be so far out, at that,”
said Cadfael, viewing the fruits of his labours complacently. “A perpetual and
pure bridal. This Welsh girl was virgin until the day of her death.” “And you have married her off since?” It was idly said, in revulsion from
pondering matters of state. In such a garden a man could believe in peace,
fruitfullness and amity. But it encountered suddenly so profound and pregnant a
silence that Hugh pricked up his ears, and turned his head almost stealthily to
study his friend, even before the unguarded answer came. Unguarded either from
absence of mind, or of design, there was no telling. “Not wedded,” said Cadfael, “but certainly
bedded. With a good man, too, and her honest champion. He deserved his reward.” Hugh raised quizzical brows, and cast a
glance over his shoulder towards the long roof of the great abbey church, where
reputedly the lady in question slept in a sealed reliquary on her own altar. An
elegant coffin just long enough to contain a small and holy Welshwoman, with
the neat, compact bones of her race. “Hardly room within there for two,” he
said mildly. “Not two of our gross make, no, not there.
There was space enough where we put them.” He knew he was listened to, now, and
heard with sharp intelligence, if not yet understood. “Are you telling me,” wondered Hugh no
less mildly, “that she is not there in that elaborate shrine of yours, where
everyone else knows she is?” “Can I tell? Many a time I’ve wished it
could be possible to be in two places at once. A thing too hard for me, but for
a saint, perhaps, possible? Three nights and three days she was in there, that
I do know. She may well have left a morsel of her holiness within, if only by
way of thanks to us who took her out again, and put her back where I still, and
always shall, believe she wished to be. But for all that,” owned Cadfael,
shaking his head, “there’s a trailing fringe of doubt that nags at me. How if I
read her wrong?” “Then your only resort is confession and penance,”
said Hugh lightly. “Not until Brother Mark is full-fledged a
priest!” Young Mark was gone from his mother-house and from his flock at Saint
Giles, gone to the household of the bishop of Lichfield, with Leoric Aspley’s
endowment to see him through his studies, and the goal of all his longings
shining distant and clear before him, the priesthood for which God had designed
him. “I’m saving for him,” said Cadfael, “all those sins I feel, perhaps
mistakenly, to be no sins. He was my right hand and a piece of my heart for
three years, and knows me better than any man living. Barring, it may be,
yourself?” he added, and slanted a guileless glance at his friend. “He will
know the truth of me, and by his judgement and for his absolution I’ll embrace
any penance. You might deliver the judgement, Hugh, but you cannot deliver the
absolution.” “Nor the penance, neither,” said Hugh, and
laughed freely. “So tell it to me, and go free without penalty.” The idea of confiding was unexpectedly
pleasing and acceptable. “It’s a long story,” said Cadfeel warningly. “Then now’s your time, for whatever I can
do here is done, nothing is asked of me but watchfulness and patience, and why
should I wait unentertained if there’s a good story to be heard? And you are at
leisure until Vespers. You may even get merit,” said Hugh, composing his face
into priestly solemnity, “by unburdening your soul to the secular arm. And I
can be secret,” he said, “as any confessional.” “Wait, then,” said Cadfael, “while I fetch
a draught of that maturing wine, and come within to the bench under the north
wall, where the afternoon sun falls. We may as well be at ease while I talk.” “It was a year or so before I knew you,”
said Cadfael, bracing his back comfortably against the warmed, stony roughness
of the herb-garden wall. “We were without a tame saint to our house, and
somewhat envious of Wenlock, where the Cluny community had discovered their
Saxon foundress Milburga, and were making great play with her. And we had
certain signs that sent off an ailing brother of ours into Wales, to bathe at
Holywell, where this girl Winifred died her first death, and brought forth her
healing spring. There was her own patron, Saint Beuno, ready and able to bring
her back to life, but the spring remained, and did wonders. So it came to Prior
Robert that the lady could be persuaded to leave Gwytherin, where she died her
second death and was buried, and come and bring her glory to us here in
Shrewsbury. I was one of the party he took with him to deal with the parish there,
and bring them to give up the saint’s bones.” “All of which,” said Hugh, warmed and
attentive beside him, “I know very well, since all men here know it.” “Surely! But you do not know to the end
what followed. There was one Welsh lord in Gwytherin who would not suffer the
girl to be disturbed, and would not be persuaded or bribed or threatened into
letting her go. And he died, Hugh, murdered. By one of us, a brother who came
from high rank, and had his eyes already set on a mitre. And when we came near
to accusing him, it was his life or a better. There were certain young people
of that place put in peril by him, the dead lord’s daughter and her lover. The
boy lashed out in anger, with good reason, seeing his girl wounded and
bleeding. He was stronger than he knew. The murderer’s neck was broken.” “How many knew of this?” asked Hugh, his
eyes narrowed thoughtfully upon the glossy-leaved rose-bushes. “When it befell, only the lovers, the dead
man and I. And Saint Winifred, who had been raised from her grave and laid in
that casket of which you and all men know. She knew. She was there. From the
moment I raised her,” said Cadfael, “and by God, it was I who took her from the
soil, and I who restored her—and still that makes me glad—from the moment I
uncovered those slender bones, I felt in mine they wished only to be left in
peace. It was so little and so wild and quiet a graveyard there, with the small
church long out of use, meadow flowers growing over all, and the mounds so
modest and green. And Welsh soil! The girl was Welsh, like me, her church was
of the old persuasion, what did she know of this alien English shire? And I had
those young things to keep. Who would have taken their word or mine against all
the force of the church? They would have closed their ranks to bury the
scandal, and bury the boy with it, and he guilty of nothing but defending his
dear. So I took measures.” Hugh’s mobile lips twitched. “Now indeed
you amaze me! And what measures were those? With a dead brother to account for,
and Prior Robert to keep sweet…” “Ah, well, Robert is a simpler soul than
he supposes, and then I had a good deal of help from the dead brother himself.
He’d been busy building himself such a reputation for sanctity, delivering
messages from the saint herself—it was he told us she was offering the grave
she’d left to the murdered man—and going into trance-sleeps, and praying to
leave this world and be taken into bliss living… So we did him that small
favour. He’d been keeping a solitary night-watch in the old church, and in the
morning when it ended, there were his habit and sandals fallen together at his
prayer-stool, and the body of him lifted clean out of them, in sweet odours and
a shower of may-blossom. That was how he claimed the saint had already visited
him, why should not Robert recall it and believe? Certainly he was gone. Why
look for him? Would a modest brother of our house be running through the Welsh
woods mother-naked?” “Are you telling me,” asked Hugh
cautiously, “That what you have there in the reliquary is not… Then the casket
had not yet been sealed?” His eyebrows were tangling with his black forelock,
but his voice was soft and unsurprised. “Well…” Cadfael twitched his blunt brown
nose bashfully between finger and thumb. “Sealed it was, but there are ways of
dealing with seals that leave them unblemished. It’s one of the more dubious of
my remembered skills, but for all that I was glad of it then.” “And you put the lady back in the place
that was hers, along with her champion?” “He was a decent, good man, and had spoken
up for her nobly. She would not grudge him house-room. I have always thought,”
confided Cadfael, “that she was not displeased with us. She has shown her power
in Gwytherin since that time, by many miracles, so I cannot believe she is
angry. But what a little troubles me is that she has not so far chosen to
favour us with any great mark of her patronage here, to keep Robert happy, and
set my mind at rest. Oh, a few little things, but nothing of unmistakable note.
How if I have displeased her, after all? Well for me, who know what we have
within there on the altar—and mea culpa if I did wrongly! But what of the
innocents who do not know, and come in good faith, hoping for grace from her?
What if I have been the means of their deprivation and loss?” “I see,” said Hugh with sympathy, “that
Brother Mark had better make haste through the degrees of ordination, and come
quickly to lift the load from you. Unless,” he added with a flashing sidelong
smile, “Saint Winifred takes pity on you first, and sends you a sign.” “I still do not see,” mused Cadfael, “what
else I could have done. It was an ending that satisfied everyone, both here and
there. The children were free to marry and be happy, the village still had its
saint, and she had her own people round her. Robert had what he had gone to
find—or thought he had, which is the same thing. And Shrewsbury abbey has its
festival, with every hope of a full guest-hall, and glory and gain in good
measure. If she would but just cast an indulgent look this way, and wink her
eye, to let me know I understood her aright.” “And you’ve never said word of this to
anyone?” “Never a word. But the whole village of
Gwytherin knows it,” admitted Cadfael with a remembering grin. “No one told, no
one had to tell, but they knew. There wasn’t a man missing when we took up the
reliquary and set out for home. They helped to carry it, whipped together a
little chariot to bear it. Robert thought he had them nicely tamed, even those
who’d been most reluctant from the first. It was a great joy to him. A simple
soul at bottom! It would be great pity to undo him now, when he’s busy writing
his book about the saint’s life, and how he brought her to Shrewsbury.” “I would not have the heart to put him to
such distress,” said Hugh. “Least said, best for all. Thanks be to God, I have
nothing to do with canon law, the common law of a land almost without law costs
me enough pains.” No need to say that Cadfael could be sure of his secrecy,
that was taken for granted on both sides. “Well, you speak the lady’s own
tongue, no doubt she understood you well enough, with or without words. Who
knows? When this festival of yours takes place—the twenty-second day of June,
you say?—she may take pity on you, and send you a great miracle to set your mind
at rest.” And so she might, thought Cadfael an hour
later, on his way to obey the summons of the Vesper bell. Not that he had
deserved so signal an honour, but there surely must be one somewhere among the
unceasing stream of pilgrims who did deserve it, and could not with justice be
rejected. He would be perfectly and humbly and cheerfully content with that.
What if she was eighty miles or so away, in what was left of her body? It had
been a miraculous body in this life, once brutally dead and raised alive again,
what limits of time or space could be set about such a being? If it so pleased
her she could be both quiet and content in her grave with Rhisiart, lulled by
bird-song in the hawthorn trees, and here attentive and incorporeal, a little
flame of spirit in the coffin of unworthy Columbanus, who had killed not for
her exaltation but for his own. Brother Cadfael went to Vespers curiously
relieved at having confided to his friend a secret from before the time when
they had first known each other, in the beginning as potential antagonists
stepping subtly to outwit each other, then discovering how much they had in
common, the old man—alone with himself Cadfael admitted to being somewhat over
the peak of a man’s prime—and the young one, just setting out, exceedingly
well-equipped in shrewdness and wit, to build his fortune and win his wife. And
both he had done, for he was now undisputed sheriff of Shropshire, if under a
powerless and captive king, and up there in the town, near St Mary’s church,
his wife and his year-old son made a nest for his private happiness when he
shut the door on his public burdens. Cadfael thought of his godson, the sturdy
imp who already clutched his way lustily round the rooms of Hugh’s town house,
climbed unaided into a godfather’s lap, and began to utter human sounds of
approval, enquiry, indignation and affection. Every man asks of heaven a son.
Hugh had his, as promising a sprig as ever budded from the stem. So, by proxy,
had Cadfael, a son in God. There was, after all, a great deal of
human happiness in the world, even a world so torn and mangled with conflict,
cruelty and greed. So it had always been, and always would be. And so be it,
provided the indomitable spark of joy never went out. In the refectory, after supper and grace,
in the grateful warmth and lingering light of the end of May, when they were
shuffling their benches to rise from table, Prior Robert Pennant rose first in
his place, levering erect his more than six feet of lean, austere prelate,
silver-tonsured and ivory-featured. “Brothers, I have received a further
message from Father Abbot. He has reached Warwick on his way home to us, and
hopes to be with us by the fourth day of June or earlier. He bids us be
diligent in making proper preparation for the celebration of Saint Winifred’s
translation, our most gracious patroness.” Perhaps the abbot had so instructed,
in duty bound, but it was Robert himself who laid such stress on it, viewing
himself, as he did, as the patron of their patroness. His large patrician eye
swept round the refectory tables, settling upon those heads most deeply
committed. “Brother Anselm, you have the music already in hand?” Brother Anselm the precentor, whose mind
seldom left its neums and instruments for many seconds together, looked up vaguely,
awoke to the question, and stared, wide-eyed. “The entire order of procession
and office is ready,” he said, in amiable surprise that anyone should feel it
necessary to ask. “And Brother Denis, you have made all the
preparations necessary for stocking your halls to feed great numbers? For we
shall surely need every cot and every dish we can muster.” Brother Denis the hospitaller, accustomed
to outer panics and secure ruler of his own domain, testified calmly that he
had made the fullest provision he considered needful, and further, that he had
reserves laid by to tap at need. “There will also be many sick persons to
be tended, for that reason they come.” Brother Edmund the infirmarer, not waiting
to be named, said crisply that he had taken into account the probable need, and
was prepared for the demands that might be made on his beds and medicines. He
mentioned also, being on his feet, that Brother Cadfael had already provided
stocks of all the remedies most likely to be wanted, and stood ready to meet
any other needs that should arise. “That is well,” said Prior Robert. “Now,
Father Abbot has yet a special request to make until he comes. He asks that
prayers be made at every High Mass for the repose of the soul of a good man,
treacherously slain in Winchester as he strove to keep the peace and reconcile
faction with faction, in Christian duty.” For a moment it seemed to Brother Cadfael,
and perhaps to most of the others present, that the death of one man, far away
in the south, hardly rated so solemn a mention and so signal a mark of respect,
in a country where deaths had been commonplace for so long, from the field of
Lincoln strewn with bodies to the sack of Worcester with its streets running
blood, from the widespread baronial slaughters by disaffected earls to the
sordid village banditries where law had broken down. Then he looked at it
again, and with the abbot’s measuring eyes. Here was a good man cut down in the
very city where prelates and barons were parleying over matters of peace and
sovereignty, killed in trying to keep one faction from the throat of the other.
At the very feet, as it were, of the bishop-legate. As black a sacrilege as if
he had been butchered on the steps of the altar. It was not one man’s death, it
was a bitter symbol of the abandonment of law and the rejection of hope and
reconciliation. So Radulfus had seen it, and so he recorded it in the offices
of his house. There was a solemn acknowledgement due to the dead man, a
memorial lodged in heaven. “We are asked,” said Prior Robert, “to
offer thanks for the just endeavour and prayers for the soul of one Rainald
Bossard, a knight in the service of the Empress Maud.” “One of the enemy,” said a young novice
doubtfully, talking it over in the cloisters afterwards. So used were they, in
this shire, to thinking of the king’s cause as their own, since it had been his
writ which had run here now in orderly fashion for four years, and kept off the
worst of the chaos that troubled so much of England elsewhere. “Not so,” said Brother Paul, the master of
the novices, gently chiding. “No good and honourable man is an enemy, though he
may take the opposing side in this dissension.” “The fealty of this world is not for us,
but we must bear it ever in mind as a true value, as binding on those who owe
it as our vows are on us. The claims of these two cousins are both in some sort
valid. It is no reproach to have kept faith, whether with king or empress. And
this was surely a worthy man, or Father Abbot would not thus have recommended
him to our prayers.” Brother Anselm, thoughtfully revolving the
syllables of the name, and tapping the resultant rhythm on the stone of the
bench on which he sat, repeated to himself softly: “Rainald Bossard, Rainald
Bossard…” The repeated iambic stayed in Brother Cadfael’s
ear and wormed its way into his mind. A name that meant nothing yet to anyone
here, had neither form nor face, no age, no character; nothing but a name,
which is either a soul without a body or a body without a soul. It went with
him into his cell in the dortoir, as he made his last prayers and shook off his
sandals before lying down to sleep. It may even have kept a rhythm in his
sleeping mind, without the need of a dream to house it, for the first he knew
of the thunderstorm was a silent double-gleam of lightning that spelled out the
same iambic, and caused him to start awake with eyes still closed, and listen
for the answering thunder. It did not come for so long that he thought he had
dreamed it, and then he heard it, very distant, very quiet, and yet curiously
ominous. Beyond his closed eyelids the quiet lightnings flared and died, and
the echoes answered so late and so softly, from so far away… As far, perhaps, as that fabled city of
Winchester, where momentous matters had been decided, a place Cadfael had never
seen, and probably never would see. A threat from a town so distant could shake
no foundations here, and no hearts, any more than such far-off thunders could
bring down the walls of Shrewsbury. Yet the continuing murmur of disquiet was still
in his ears as he fell asleep. Chapter Two ABBOT RADULFUS RODE BACK into his abbey of
Saint Peter and Saint Paul on the third day of June, escorted by his chaplain
and secretary, Brother Vitalis, and welcomed home by all the fifty-three
brothers, seven novices and six schoolboys of his house, as well as all the lay
stewards and servants. The abbot was a long, lean, hard man in
his fifties, with a gaunt, ascetic face and a shrewd, scholar’s eye, so
vigorous and able of body that he dismounted and went straight to preside at
High Mass, before retiring to remove the stains of travel or take any
refreshment after his long ride. Nor did he forget to offer the prayer he had
enjoined upon his flock, for the repose of the soul of Rainald Bossard, slain
in Winchester on the evening of Wednesday, the ninth day of April of this year
of Our Lord 1141. Eight weeks dead, and half the length of England away, what
meaning could Rainald Bossard have for this indifferent town of Shrewsbury, or
the members of this far-distant Benedictine house? Not until the next morning’s chapter would
the household hear its abbot’s account of that momentous council held in the
south to determine the future of England; but when Hugh Beringar waited upon
Radulfus about mid-afternoon, and asked for audience, he was not kept waiting.
Affairs demanded the close co-operation of the secular and the clerical powers,
in defence of such order and law as survived in England. The abbot’s private parlour in his lodging
was as austere as its presiding father, plainly furnished, but with sunlight
spilled across its flagged floor from two open lattices at this hour of the
sun’s zenith, and a view of gracious greenery and glowing flowers in the small
walled garden without. Quiverings of radiance flashed and vanished and recoiled
and collided over the dark panelling within, from the new-budded life and fresh
breeze and exuberant light outside. Hugh sat in shadow, and watched the abbot’s
trenchant profile, clear, craggy and dark against a ground of shifting brightness. “My allegiance is well known to you,
Father,” said Hugh, admiring the stillness of the noble mask thus framed, “as
yours is to me. But there is much that we share. Whatever you can tell me of
what passed in Winchester, I do greatly need to know.” “And I to understand,” said Radulfus, with
a tight and rueful smile. “I went as summoned, by him who has a right to summon
me, and I went knowing how matters then stood, the king a prisoner, the empress
mistress of much of the south, and in due position to claim sovereignty by
right of conquest. We knew, you and I both, what would be in debate down there.
I can only give you my own account as I saw it. The first day that we gathered
there, a Monday it was, the seventh of April, there was nothing done by way of
business but the ceremonial of welcoming us all, and reading out—there were
many of these!—the letters sent by way of excuse from those who remained
absent. The empress had a lodging in the town then, though she made several
moves about the region, to Reading and other places, while we debated. She did
not attend. She has a measure of discretion.” His tone was dry. It was not
clear whether he considered her measure of that commodity to be adequate or
somewhat lacking. “The second day…” He fell silent, remembering what he had
witnessed. Hugh waited attentively, not stirring. “The second day, the eighth of April, the
legate made his great speech…” It was no effort to imagine him. Henry of
Blois, bishop of Winchester, papal legate, younger brother and hitherto
partisan of King Stephen, impregnably ensconced in the chapter house of his own
cathedral, secure master of the political pulse of England, the cleverest
manipulator in the kingdom, and on his own chosen ground—and yet hounded on to
the defensive, in so far as that could ever happen to so expert a practitioner.
Hugh had never seen the man, never been near the region where he ruled, had
only heard him described, and yet could see him now, presiding with imperious
composure over his half-unwilling assembly. A difficult part he had to play, to
extricate himself from his known allegiance to his brother, and yet preserve
his face and his status and influence with those who had shared it. And with a
tough, experienced woman narrowly observing his every word, and holding in
reserve her own new powers to destroy or preserve, according to how he managed
his ill-disciplined team in this heavy furrow. “He spoke a tedious while,” said the abbot
candidly, “but he is a very able speaker. He put us in mind that we were met
together to try to salvage England from chaos and ruin. He spoke of the late
King Henry’s time, when order and peace was kept throughout the land. And he
reminded us how the old king, left without a son, commanded his barons to swear
an oath of allegiance to his only remaining child, his daughter Maud the
empress, now widowed, and wed again to the count of Anjou.” And so those barons had done, almost all,
not least this same Henry of Winchester. Hugh Beringar, who had never come to
such a test until he was ready to choose for himself, curled a half-disdainful
and half-commiserating lip, and nodded understanding. “His lordship had
somewhat to explain away.” The abbot refrained from indicating, by
word or look, agreement with the implied criticism of his brother cleric. “He
said that the long delay which might then have arisen from the empress’s being
in Normandy had given rise to natural concern for the well-being of the state.
An interim of uncertainty was dangerous. And thus, he said, his brother Count Stephen
was accepted when he offered himself, and became king by consent. His own part
in this acceptance he admitted. For he it was who pledged his word to God and
men that King Stephen would honour and revere the Holy Church, and maintain the
good and just laws of the land. In which undertaking, said Henry, the king has
shamefully failed. To his great chagrin and grief he declared it, having been
his brother’s guarantor to God.” So that was the way round the humiliating
change of course, thought Hugh. All was to be laid upon Stephen, who had so
deceived his reverend brother and defaulted upon all his promises, that a man
of God might well be driven to the end of his patience, and be brought to
welcome a change of monarch with relief tempering his sorrow. “In particular,” said Radulfus, “he
recalled how the king had hounded certain of his bishops to their ruin and
death.” There was more than a grain of truth in
that, though the only death in question, of Robert of Salisbury, had resulted
naturally from old age, bitterness and despair, because his power was gone. “Therefore, he said,” continued the abbot
with chill deliberation, “the judgement of God had been manifested against the
king, in delivering him up prisoner to his enemies. And he, devout in the service
of the Holy Church, must choose between his devotion to his mortal brother and
to his immortal father, and could not but bow to the edict of heaven. Therefore
he had called us together, to ensure that a kingdom lopped of its head should
not founder in utter ruin. And this very matter, he told the assembly, had been
discussed most gravely on the day previous among the greater part of the clergy
of England, who—he said!—had a prerogative surmounting others in the election
and consecration of a king.” There was something in the dry, measured
voice that made Hugh prick up his ears. For this was a large and unprecedented
claim, and by all the signs Abbot Radulfus found it more than suspect. The
legate had his own face to save, and a well-oiled tongue with which to wind the
protective mesh of words before it. “Was there such a meeting? Were you
present at such, Father?” “There was a meeting,” said Radulfus, “not
prolonged, and by no means very clear in its course. The greater part of the
talking was done by the legate. The empress had her partisans there.” He said
it sedately and tolerantly, but clearly he had not been one. “I do not recall
that he then claimed this prerogative for us. Nor that there was ever a count
taken.” “Nor, as I guess, declared. It would not
come to a numbering of heads or hands.” Too easy, then, to start a
counter-count of one’s own, and confound the reckoning. “He continued,” said Radulfus coolly and
drily, “by saying that we had chosen as Lady of England the late king’s
daughter, the inheritor of his nobility and his will to peace. As the sire was
unequalled in merit in our times, so might his daughter flourish and bring
peace, as he did, to this troubled country, where we now offer her—he said!—our
whole-hearted fealty.” So the legate had extricated himself as
adroitly as possible from his predicament. But for all that, so resolute,
courageous and vindictive a lady as the empress was going to look somewhat
sidewise at a whole-hearted fealty which had already once been pledged to her,
and turned its back nimbly under pressure, and might as nimbly do so again. If
she was wise she would curb her resentment and take care to keep on the right
side of the legate, as he was cautiously feeling his way to the right side of
her; but she would not forget or forgive. “And there was no man raised a word
against it?” asked Hugh mildly. “None. There was small opportunity, and
even less inducement. And with that the bishop announced that he had invited a
deputation from the city of London, and expected them to arrive that day, so
that it was expedient we should adjourn our discussion until the morrow. Even
so, the Londoners did not come until next day, and we met again somewhat later
than on the days previous. Howbeit, they did come. With somewhat dour faces and
stiff necks. They said that they represented the whole commune of London, into
which many barons had also entered as members after Lincoln, and that they all,
with no wish to challenge the legitimacy of our assembly, yet desired to put
forward with one voice the request that the lord king should be set at
liberty.” “That was bold,” said Hugh with raised
brows. “How did his lordship counter it? Was he put out of countenance?” “I think he was shaken, but not
disastrously, not then. He made a long speech—it is a way of keeping others
silent, at least for a time—reproving the city for taking into its membership
men who had abandoned their king in war, after leading him astray by their evil
advice, so grossly that he forsook God and right, and was brought to the
judgement of defeat and captivity, from which the prayers of those same false
friends could not now reprieve him. These men do but flatter and favour you
now, he said, for their own advantage.” “If he meant the Flemings who ran from
Lincoln,” Hugh allowed, “he told no more than truth there. But for what other
end is the city ever flattered and wooed? What then? Had they the hardihood to
stand their ground against him?” “They were in some disarray as to what
they should reply, and went apart to confer. And while there was quiet, a man
suddenly stepped forward from among the clerks, and held out a parchment to
Bishop Henry, asking him to read it aloud, so confidently that I wonder still
he did not at once comply. Instead, he opened and began to read it in silence,
and in a moment more he was thundering in a great rage that the thing was an
insult to the reverend company present, its matter disgraceful, its witnesses
attainted enemies of Holy Church, and not a word of it would he read aloud to
us in so sacred a place as his chapter house. “Whereupon,” said the abbot
grimly, “the clerk snatched it back from him, and himself read it aloud in a
great voice, riding above the bishop when he tried to silence him. It was a
plea from Stephen’s queen to all present, and to the legate in especial, own
brother to the king, to return to fealty and restore the king to his own again
from the base captivity into which traitors had betrayed him. And I, said the
brave man who read, am a clerk in the service of Queen Matilda, and if any ask
my name, it is Christian, and true Christian I am as any here, and true to my
salt.” “Brave, indeed!” said Hugh, and whistled
softly. “But I doubt it did him little good.” “The legate replied to him in a tirade,
much as he had spoken already to us the day before, but in a great passion, and
so intimidated the men from London that they drew in their horns, and
grudgingly agreed to report the council’s election to their citizens, and
support it as best they could. As for the man Christian, who had so angered
Bishop Henry, he was attacked that same evening in the street, as he set out to
return to the queen empty-handed. Four or five ruffians set on him in the dark,
no one knows who, for they fled when one of the empress’s knights and his men came
to the rescue and beat them off, crying shame to use murder as argument in any
cause, and against an honest man who had done his part fearlessly in the open.
The clerk got no worse than a few bruises. It was the knight who got the knife
between his ribs from behind and into the heart. He died in the gutter of a
Winchester street. A shame to us all, who claim to be making peace and bringing
enemies into amity.” By the shadowed anger of his face it had
gone deep with him, the single wanton act that denied all pretences of good
will and justice and conciliation. To strike at a man for being honestly of the
opposite persuasion, and then to strike again at the fair-minded and chivalrous
who sought to prevent the outrage—very ill omens, these, for the future of the
legate’s peace. “And no man taken for the killing?”
demanded Hugh, frowning. “No. They fled in the dark. If any
creature knows name or hiding-place, he has spoken no word. Death is so common
a matter now, even by stealth and treachery in the darkness, this will be
forgotten with the rest. And the next day our council closed with sentence of
excommunication against a great number of Stephen’s men, and the legate
pronounced all men blessed who would bless the empress, and accursed those who
cursed her. And so dismissed us,” said Radulfus. “But that we monastics were
not dismissed, but kept to attend on him some weeks longer.” “And the empress?” “Withdrew to Oxford, while these long
negotiations with the city of London went on, how and when she should be admitted
within the gates, on what terms, what numbers she might bring in with her to
Westminster. On all which points they have wrangled every step of the way. But
in nine or ten days now she will be installed there, and soon thereafter
crowned.” He lifted a long, muscular hand, and again let it fall into the lap
of his habit. “So, at least, it seems. What more can I tell you of her?” “I meant, rather,” said Hugh, “how is she
bearing this slow recognition? How is she dealing with her newly converted
barons? And how do they rub, one with another? It’s no easy matter to hold
together the old and the new liegemen, and keep them from each other’s throats.
A manor in dispute here and there, a few fields taken from one and given to
another… I think you know the way of it, Father, as well as I.” “I would not say she is a wise woman,”
said Radulfus carefully. “She is all too well aware how many swore allegiance
to her at her father’s order, and then swung to King Stephen, and now as nimbly
skip back to her because she is in the ascendant. I can well understand she
might take pleasure in pricking into the quick where she can, among these. It
is not wise, but it is human. But that she should become lofty and cold to
those who never wavered—for there are some,” said the abbot with respectful
wonder, “who have been faithful throughout at their own great loss, and will
not waver even now, whatever she may do. Great folly and great injustice to use
them so highhandedly, who have been her right hand and her left all this while.” You comfort me, thought Hugh, watching the
lean, quiet face intently. The woman is out of her wits if she flouts even the
like of Robert of Gloucester, now she feels herself so near the throne. “She has greatly offended the
bishop-legate,” said the abbot, “by refusing to allow Stephen’s son to receive
the rights and titles of his father’s honours of Boulogne and Mortain, now that
his father is a prisoner. It would have been only justice. But no, she would
not suffer it. Bishop Henry quit her court for some while, it took her
considerable pains to lure him back again.” Better and better, thought Hugh, assessing
his position with care. If she is stubborn enough to drive away even Henry, she
can undo everything he and others do for her. Put the crown in her hands and
she may, not so much drop it, as hurl it at someone against whom she has a
score to settle. He set himself to extract every detail of her subsequent
behaviour, and was cautiously encouraged. She had taken land from some who held
it and given it to others. She had received her naturally bashful new adherents
with arrogance, and reminded them ominously of their past hostility. Some she
had even repulsed with anger, recalling old injuries. Candidates for a disputed
crown should be more accommodatingly forgetful. Let her alone, and pray! She,
if anyone, could bring about her own ruin. At the end of a long hour he rose to take
his leave, with a very fair picture in his mind of the possibilities he had to
face. Even empresses may learn, and she might yet inveigle herself safely into
Westminster and assume the crown. It would not do to underestimate William of
Normandy’s grand-daughter and Henry the First’s daughter. Yet that very stock
might come to wreck on its own unforgiving strength. He was never afterwards sure why he turned
back at the last moment to ask: “Father Abbot, this man Rainald Bossard, who
died… A knight of the empress, you said. In whose following?” All that he had learned he confided to
Brother Cadfael in the hut in the herb-garden, trying out upon his friend’s
unexcitable solidity his own impressions and doubts, like a man sharpening a
scythe on a good memorial stone. Cadfael was fussing over a too-exuberant wine,
and seemed not to be listening, but Hugh remained undeceived. His friend had a
sharp ear cocked for every intonation, even turned a swift glance occasionally
to confirm what his ear heard, and reckon up the double account. “You’d best lean back, then,” said Cadfael
finally, “and watch what will follow. You might also, I suppose, have a good
man take a look at Bristol? He is the only hostage she has. With the king
loosed, or Robert, or Brian Fitz-Count, or some other of sufficient note made
prisoner to match him, you’d be on secure ground. God forgive me, why am I
advising you, who have no prince in this world!” But he was none too sure about
the truth of that, having had brief, remembered dealings with Stephen himself,
and liked the man, even at his ill-advised worst, when he had slaughtered the
garrison of Shrewsbury castle, to regret it as long as his ebullient memory
kept nudging him with the outrage. By now, in his dungeon in Bristol, he might
well have forgotten the uncharacteristic savagery. “And do you know,” asked Hugh with
deliberation, “whose man was this knight Rainald Bossard, left bleeding to
death in the lanes of Winchester? He for whom your prayers have been demanded?” Cadfael turned from his boisterously
bubbling jar to narrow his eyes on his friend’s face. “The empress’s man is all
we’ve been told. But I see you’re about to tell me more.” “He was in the following of Laurence
d’Angers.” Cadfael straightened up with incautious
haste, and grunted at the jolt to his ageing back. It was the name of a man
neither of them had ever set eyes on, yet it started vivid memories for them
both. “Yes, that Laurence! A baron of
Gloucestershire, and liegeman to the empress. One of the few who has not once
turned his coat yet in this to-ing and fro-ing, and uncle to those two children
you helped away from Bromfield to join him, when they went astray after the
sack of Worcester. Do you still remember the cold of that winter? And the wind
that scoured away hills of snow overnight and laid them down in fresh places
before morning? I still feel it, clean through flesh and bone…” There was nothing about that winter
journey that Cadfael would ever forget. It was hardly a year and a half past,
the attack on the city of Worcester, the flight of brother and sister
northwards towards Shrewsbury, through the worst weather for many a year.
Laurence d’Angers had been but a name in the business, as he was now in this.
An adherent of the Empress Maud, he had been denied leave to enter King
Stephen’s territory to search for his young kin, but he had sent a squire in
secret to find and fetch them away. To have borne a hand in the escape of those
three was something to remember lifelong. All three arose living before
Cadfael’s mind’s eye, the boy Yves, thirteen years old then, ingenuous and
gallant and endearing, jutting a stubborn Norman chin at danger, his elder
sister Ermina, newly shaken into womanhood and resolutely shouldering the
consequences of her own follies. And the third… “I have often wondered,” said Hugh
thoughtfully, “how they fared afterwards. I knew you would get them off safely,
if I left it to you, but it was still a perilous road before them. I wonder if
we shall ever get word. Some day the world will surely hear of Yves Hugonin.”
At the thought of the boy he smiled with affectionate amusement. “And that dark
lad who fetched them away, he who dressed like a woodsman and fought like a
paladin… I fancy you knew more of him than ever I got to know.” Cadfael smiled into the glow of the
brazier and did not deny it. “So his lord is there in the empress’s train, is
he? And this knight who was killed was in d’Angers’ service? That was a very
ill thing, Hugh.” “So Abbot Radulfus thinks,” said Hugh
sombrely. “In the dusk and in confusion—and all got
clean away, even the one who used the knife. A foul thing, for surely that was
no chance blow. The clerk Christian escaped out of their hands, yet one among
them turned on the rescuer before he fled. It argues a deal of hate at being
thwarted, to have ventured that last moment before running. And is it left so?
And Winchester full of those who should most firmly stand for justice?” “Why, some among them would surely have
been well enough pleased if that bold clerk had spilled his blood in the
gutter, as well as the knight. Some may well have set the hunt on him.” “Well for the empress’s good name,” said
Cadfael, “that there was one at least of her men stout enough to respect an
honest opponent, and stand by him to the death. And shame if that death goes
unpaid for.” “Old friend,” said Hugh ruefully, rising
to take his leave, “England has had to swallow many such a shame these last
years. It grows customary to sigh and shrug and forget. At which, as I know,
you are a very poor hand. And I have seen you overturn custom more than once,
and been glad of it. But not even you can do much now for Rainald Bossard, bar
praying for his soul. It is a very long way from here to Winchester.” “It is not so far,” said Cadfael, as much
to himself as to his friend, “not by many a mile, as it was an hour since.” He went to Vespers, and to supper in the
refectory, and thereafter to Collations and Compline, and all with one
remembered face before his mind’s eye, so that he paid but fractured attention
to the readings, and had difficulty in concentrating his thoughts on prayer.
Though it might have been a kind of prayer he was offering throughout, in
gratitude and praise and humility. So suave, so young, so dark and vital a
face, startling in its beauty when he had first seen it over the girl’s
shoulder, the face of the young squire sent to bring away the Hugonin children
to their uncle and guardian. A long, spare, wide-browed face, with a fine
scimitar of a nose and a supple bow of a mouth, and the fierce, fearless,
golden eyes of a hawk. A head capped closely with curving, blue-black hair,
coiling crisply at his temples and clasping his cheeks like folded wings. So
young and yet so formed a face, east and west at home in it, shaven clean like
a Norman, olive-skinned like a Syrian, all his memories of the Holy Land in one
human countenance. The favourite squire of Laurence d’Angers, come home with
him from the Crusade. Olivier de Bretagne. If his lord was there in the south with
his following, in the empress’s retinue, where else would Olivier be? The abbot
might even have rubbed shoulders with him, unbeknown, or seen him ride past at
his lord’s elbow, and for one absent moment admired his beauty. Few such faces
blaze out of the humble mass of our ordinariness, thought Cadfael, the finger
of God cannot choose but mark them out for notice, and his officers here will
be the first to recognise and own them. And this Rainald Bossard who is dead, an
honourable man doing right by an honourable opponent, was Olivier’s comrade,
owning the same lord and pledged to the same service. His death will be grief
to Olivier. Grief to Olivier is grief to me, a wrong done to Olivier is a wrong
done to me. As far away as Winchester may be, here am I left mourning in that
dark street where a man died for a generous act, in which, by the same token,
he did not fail, for the clerk Christian lived on to return to his lady, the
queen, with his errand faithfully done. The gentle rustlings and stirrings of the
dortoir sighed into silence outside the frail partitions of Cadfael’s cell long
before he rose from his knees, and shook off his sandals. The little lamp by
the night stairs cast only the faintest gleam across the beams of the roof, a
ceiling of pearly grey above the darkness of his cell, his home now for—was it
eighteen years or nineteen?—he had difficulty in recalling. It was as if a part
of him, heart, mind, soul, whatever that essence might be, had not so much
retired as come home to take seisin of a heritage here, his from his birth. And
yet he remembered and acknowledged with gratitude and joy the years of his
sojourning in the world, the lusty childhood and venturous youth, the taking of
the Cross and the passion of the Crusade, the women he had known and loved, the
years of his sea-faring off the coast of the Holy Kingdom of Jerusalem, all
that pilgrimage that had led him here at last to his chosen retreat. None of it
wasted, however foolish and amiss, nothing lost, nothing vain, all of it
somehow fitting him to the narrow niche where now he served and rested. God had
given him a sign, he had no need to regret anything, only to lay all open and
own it his. For God’s viewing, not for man’s. He lay quiet in the darkness, straight and
still like a man coffined, but easy, with his arms lax at his sides, and his
half-closed eyes dreaming on the vault above him, where the faint light played
among the beams. There was no lightning that night, only a
consort of steady rolls of thunder both before and after Matins and Lauds, so
unalarming that many among the brothers failed to notice them. Cadfael heard
them as he rose, and as he returned to his rest. They seemed to him a reminder
and a reassurance that Winchester had indeed moved nearer to Shrewsbury, and
consoled him that his grievance was not overlooked, but noted in heaven, and he
might look to have his part yet in collecting the debt due to Rainald Bossard. Upon
which warranty, he fell asleep. Chapter Three ON THE SEVENTEENTH DAY of June Saint
Winifred’s elaborate oak coffin, silver-ornamented and lined with lead behind
all its immaculate seals, was removed from its place of honour and carried with
grave and subdued ceremony back to its temporary resting-place in the chapel of
the hospital of Saint Giles, there to wait, as once before, for the auspicious
day, the twenty-second of June. The weather was fair, sunny and still, barely a
cloud in the sky, and yet cool enough for travelling, the best of weather for
pilgrims. And by the eighteenth day the pilgrims began to arrive, a scattering
of fore-runners before the full tide began to flow. Brother Cadfael had watched the reliquary
depart on its memorial journey with a slightly guilty mind, for all his honest
declaration that he could hardly have done otherwise than he had done, there in
the summer night in Gwytherin. So strongly had he felt, above all, her
Welshness, the feeling she must have for the familiar tongue about her, and the
tranquil flow of the seasons in her solitude, where she had slept so long and
so well in her beatitude, and worked so many small, sweet miracles for her own
people. No, he could not believe he had made a wrong choice there. If only she
would glance his way, and smile, and say, well done! The very first of the pilgrims came
probing into the walled herb-garden, with Brother Denis’s directions to guide
him, in search of a colleague in his own mystery. Cadfael was busy weeding the close-planted
beds of mint and thyme and sage late in the afternoon, a tedious, meticulous
labour in the ripeness of a favourable June, after spring sun and shower had
been nicely balanced, and growth was a green battlefield. He backed out of a
cleansed bed, and backed into a solid form, rising startled from his knees to
turn and face a rusty black brother shaped very much like himself, though
probably fifteen years younger. They stood at gaze, two solid, squarely built
brethren of the Order, eyeing each other in instant recognition and
acknowledgement. “You must be Brother Cadfael,” said the
stranger-brother in a broad, melodious bass voice. “Brother Hospitaller told me
where to find you. My name is Adam, a brother of Reading. I have the very
charge there that you bear here, and I have heard tell of you, even as far
south as my house.” His eye was roving, as he spoke, towards
some of Cadfael’s rarer treasures, the eastern poppies he had brought from the
Holy Land and reared here with anxious care, the delicate fig that still
contrived to thrive against the sheltering north wall, where the sun nursed it.
Cadfael warmed to him for the quickening of his eye, and the mild greed that
flushed the round, shaven face. A sturdy, stalwart man, who moved as if
confident of his body, one who might prove a man of his hands if challenged.
Well-weathered, too, a genuine outdoor man. “You’re more than welcome, brother,” said
Cadfael heartily. “You’ll be here for the saint’s feast? And have they found
you a place in the dortoir? There are a few cells vacant, for any of our own
who come, like you.” “My abbot sent me from Reading with a
mission to our daughter house of Leominster,” said Brother Adam, probing with
an experimental toe into the rich, well-fed loam of Brother Cadfael’s bed of
mint, and raising an eyebrow respectfully at the quality he found. “I asked if
I might prolong the errand to attend on the translation of Saint Winifred, and
I was given the needful permission. It’s seldom I could hope to be sent so far
north, and it would be pity to miss such an opportunity.” “And they’ve found you a brother’s bed?”
Such a man, Benedictine, gardener and herbalist, could not be wasted on a bed
in the guest-hall. Cadfael coveted him, marking the bright eye with which the
newcomer singled out his best endeavours. “Brother Hospitaller was so gracious. I am
placed in a cell close to the novices.” “We shall be near neighbours,” said
Cadfael contentedly. “Now come, I’ll show you whatever we have here to show,
for the main garden is on the far side of the Foregate, along the bank of the
river. But here I keep my own herber. And if there should be anything here that
can be safely carried to Reading, you may take cuttings most gladly before you
leave us.” They fell into a very pleasant and voluble
discussion, perambulating all the walks of the closed garden, and comparing
experiences in cultivation and use. Brother Adam of Reading had a sharp eye for
rarities, and was likely to go home laden with spoils. He admired the neatness
and order of Cadfael’s workshop, the collection of rustling bunches of dried
herbs hung from the roof-beams and under the eaves, and the array of bottles,
jars and flagons along the shelves. He had hints and tips of his own to
propound, too, and the amiable contest kept them happy all the afternoon. When
they returned together to the great court before Vespers it was to a scene
notably animated, as if the bustle of celebration was already beginning. There
were horses being led down into the stableyard, and bundles being carried in at
the guest-hall. A stout elderly man, well equipped for riding, paced across
towards the church to pay his first respects on arrival, with a servant
trotting at his heels. Brother Paul’s youngest charges, all eyes
and curiosity, ringed the gatehouse to watch the early arrivals, and were
shooed aside by Brother Jerome, very busy as usual with all the prior’s
errands. Though the boys did not go very far, and formed their ring again as
soon as Jerome was out of sight. A few of the citizens of the Foregate had
gathered in the street to watch, excited dogs running among their legs. “Tomorrow,” said Cadfael, eyeing the
scene, “there will be many more. This is but the beginning. Now if the weather
stays fair we shall have a very fine festival for our saint.” And she will understand that all is in her
honour, he thought privately, even if she does lie very far from here. And who
knows whether she may not pay us a visit, out of the kindness of her heart?
What is distance to a saint, who can be where she wills in the twinkling of an
eye? The guest-hall filled steadily on the
morrow. All day long they came, some singly, some in groups as they had met and
made comfortable acquaintance on the road, some afoot, some on ponies, some
whole and hearty and on holiday, some who had travelled only a few miles, some
who came from far away, and among them a number who went on crutches, or were
led along by better-sighted friends, or had grievous deformities or skin
diseases, or debilitating illnesses; and all these hoping for relief. Cadfael went about the regular duties of
his day, divided between church and herbarium, but with an interested eye open
for all there was to see whenever he crossed the great court, boiling now with
activity. Every arriving figure, every face, engaged his notice, but as yet
distantly, none being provided with a name, to make him individual. Such of
them as needed his services for relief would be directed to him, such as came
his way by chance would be entitled to his whole attention, freely offered. It was the woman he noticed first,
bustling across the court from the gatehouse to the guest-hall with a basket on
her arm, fresh from the Foregate market with new-baked bread and little cakes,
soon after Prime. A careful housewife, to be off marketing so early even on
holiday, decided about what she wanted, and not content to rely on the abbey
bakehouse to provide it. A sturdy, confident figure of a woman, perhaps fifty
years of age but in full rosy bloom. Her dress was sober and plain, but of good
material and proudly kept, her wimple snow-white beneath her head-cloth of
brown linen. She was not tall, but so erect that she could pass for tall, and
her face was round, wide-eyed and broad-cheeked, with a determined chin to it. She vanished briskly into the guest-hall,
and he caught but a glimpse of her, but she was positive enough to stay with
him through the offices and duties of the morning, and as the worshippers left
the church after Mass he caught sight of her again, arms spread like a hen-wife
driving her birds, marshalling two chicks, it seemed, before her, both largely
concealed beyond her ample width and bountiful skirts. Indeed she had a general
largeness about her, her head-dress surely taller and broader than need, her
hips bolstered by petticoats, the aura of bustle and command she bore about
with her equally generous and ebullient. He felt a wave of warmth go out to her
for her energy and vigour, while he spared a morsel of sympathy for the chicks
she mothered, stowed thus away beneath such ample, smothering wings. In the afternoon, busy about his small
kingdom and putting together the medicaments he must take along the Foregate to
Saint Giles in the morning, to be sure they had provision enough over the
feast, he was not thinking of her, nor of any of the inhabitants of the
guest-hall, since none had as yet had occasion to call for his aid. He was
packing lozenges into a small box, soothing tablets for scoured, dry throats,
when a bulky shadow blocked the open door of his workshop, and a brisk, light
voice said, “Pray your pardon, brother, but Brother Denis advised me to come to
you, and sent me here.” And there she stood, filling the doorway,
shoulders squared, hands folded at her waist, head braced and face full
forward. Her eyes, wide and wide-set, were bright blue but meagrely supplied
with pale lashes, yet very firm and fixed in their regard. “It’s my young nephew, you see, brother,”
she went on confidently, “my sister’s son, that was fool enough to go off and
marry a roving Welshman from Builth, and now her man’s gone, and so is she,
poor lass, and left her two children orphan, and nobody to care for them but
me. And me with my own husband dead, and all his craft fallen to me to manage,
and never a chick of my own to be my comfort. Not but what I can do very well
with the work and the journeymen, for I’ve learned these twenty years what was
what in the weaving trade, but still I could have done with a son of my own.
But it was not to be, and a sister’s son is dearly welcome, so he is, whether he
has his health or no, for he’s the dearest lad ever you saw. And it’s the pain,
you see, brother. I don’t like to see him in pain, though he doesn’t complain.
So I’m come to you.” Cadfael made haste to wedge a toe into
this first chink in her volubility, and insert a few words of his own into the
gap. “Come within, mistress, and welcome. Tell
me what’s the nature of your lad’s pain, and what I can do for you and him I’ll
do. But best I should see him and speak with him, for he best knows where he
hurts. Sit down and be easy, and tell me about him.” She came in confidently enough, and
settled herself with a determined spreading of ample skirts on the bench
against the wall. Her gaze went round the laden shelves, the stored herbs
dangling, the brazier and the pots and flasks, interested and curious, but in
no way awed by Cadfael or his mysteries. “I’m from the cloth country down by
Campden, brother, Weaver by name and by trade was my man, and his father and
grandfather before him, and Alice Weaver is my name, and I keep up the work
just as he did. But this young sister of mine, she went off with a Welshman,
and the pair of them are dead now, and the children I sent for to live with me.
The girl is eighteen years old now, a good, hard-working maid, and I daresay we
shall contrive to find a decent match for her in the end, though I shall miss
her help, for she’s grown very handy, and is strong and healthy, not like the
lad. Named for some outlandish Welsh saint, she is, Melangell, if ever you
heard the like!” “I’m Welsh myself,” said Cadfael
cheerfully. “Our Welsh names do come hard on your English tongues, I know.” “Ah well, the boy brought a name with him
that’s short and simple enough. Rhun, they named him. Sixteen he is now, two
years younger than his sister, but wants her heartiness, poor soul. He’s
well-grown enough, and very comely, but from a child something went wrong with
his right leg, it’s twisted and feebled so he can put but the very toe of it to
the ground at all, and even that turned on one side, and can lay no weight on
it, but barely touch. He goes on two crutches. And I’ve brought him here in the
hope good Saint Winifred will do something for him. But it’s cost him dear to
make the walk, even though we started out three weeks ago, and have taken it by
easy shifts.” “He’s walked the whole way?” asked
Cadfael, dismayed. “I’m not so prosperous I can afford a
horse, more than the one they need for the business at home. Twice on the way a
kind carter did give him a ride as far as he was bound, but the rest he’s
hobbled on his crutches. Many another at this feast, brother, will have done as
much, in as bad case or worse. But he’s here now, safe in the guest-hall, and
if my prayers can do anything for him, he’ll walk home again on two sound legs
as ever held up a hale and hearty man. But now for these few days he suffers as
bad as before.” “You should have brought him here with
you,” said Cadfael. “What’s the nature of his pain? Is it in moving, or when he
lies still? Is it the bones of the leg that ache?” “It’s worst in his bed at night. At home
I’ve often heard him weeping for pain in the night, though he tries to keep it
so silent we need not be disturbed. Often he gets little or no sleep. His bones
do ache, that’s truth, but also the sinews of his calf knot into such cramps it
makes him groan.” “There can be something done about that,”
said Cadfael, considering. “At least we may try. And there are draughts can
dull the pain and help him to a night’s sleep, at any rate.” “It isn’t that I don’t trust to the saint,”
explained Mistress Weaver anxiously. “But while he waits for her, let him be at
rest if he can, that’s what I say. Why should not a suffering lad seek help
from ordinary decent mortals, too, good men like you who have faith and
knowledge both?” “Why not, indeed!” agreed Cadfael. “The
least of us may be an instrument of grace, though not by his own deserving.
Better let the boy come to me here, where we can be private together. The
guest-hall will be busy and noisy, here we shall have quiet.” She rose, satisfied, to take her leave,
but she had plenty yet to say even in departing of the long, slow journey, the
small kindnesses they had met with on the way, and the fellow pilgrims, some of
whom had passed them and arrived here before them. “There’s more than one in there,” said
she, wagging her head towards the lofty rear wall of the guest-hall, “will be
needing your help, besides my Rhun. There were two young fellows we came along
with the last days, we could keep pace with them, for they were slowed much as
we were. Oh, the one of them was hale and lusty enough, but would not stir a
step ahead of his friend, and that poor soul had come barefoot more miles even
than Rhun had come crippled, and his feet a sight for pity, but would he so
much as bind them with rags? Not he! He said he was under vow to go unshod to
his journey’s end. And a great heavy cross on a string round his neck, too, and
he rubbed raw with the chafing of it, but that was part of his vow, too. I see
no reason why a fine young fellow should choose such a torment of his own will,
but there, folk do strange things, I daresay he hopes to win some great mercy
for himself with his austerities. Still, I should think he might at least get
some balm for his feet, while he’s here at rest? Shall I bid him come to you?
I’d gladly do a small service for that pair. The other one, Matthew, the sturdy
one, he hefted my girl safe out of the way of harm when some mad horsemen in a
hurry all but rode us down into the ditch, and he carried our bundles for her
after, for she was well loaded, I being busy helping Rhun along. Truth to tell,
I think the young man was taken with our Melangell, for he was very attentive
to her once we joined company. More than to his friend, though indeed he never
stirred a step away from him. A vow is a vow, I suppose, and if a man’s taken
all that suffering on himself of his own will, what can another do to prevent
it? No more than bear him company, and that the lad is doing, faithfully, for
he never leaves him.” She was out of the door and spreading
appreciative nostrils for the scent of the sunlit herbs, when she looked back
to add: “There’s others among them may call themselves pilgrims as loud and
often as they will, but I wouldn’t trust one or two of them as far as I could
throw them. I suppose rogues will make their way everywhere, even among the
saints.” “As long as the saints have money in their
purses, or anything about them worth stealing,” agreed Cadfael wryly, “rogues
will never be far away.” Whether Mistress Weaver did speak to her
strange travelling companion or not, it was he who arrived at Cadfael’s
workshop within half an hour, before ever the boy Rhun showed his face. Cadfael
was back at his weeding when he heard them come, or heard, rather, the slow,
patient footsteps of the sturdy one stirring the gravel of his pathways. The
other made no sound in walking, for he stepped tenderly and carefully in the
grass border, which was cool and kind to his misused feet. If there was any
sound to betray his coming it was the long, effortful sighing of his breath,
the faint, indrawn hiss of pain. As soon as Cadfael straightened his back and
turned his head, he knew who came. They were much of an age, and even
somewhat alike in build and colouring, above middle height but that the one
stooped in his laboured progress, brown-haired and dark of eye, and perhaps
twenty-five or twenty-six years old. Yet not so like that they could have been
brothers or close kin. The hale one had the darker complexion, as though he had
been more in the air and the sun, and broader bones of cheek and jaw, a
stubborn, proud, secret face, disconcertingly still, confiding nothing. The
sufferer’s face was long, mobile and passionate, with high cheekbones and
hollow cheeks beneath them, and a mouth tight-drawn, either with present pain
or constant passion. Anger might be one of his customary companions, burning
ardour another. The young man Matthew stalked at his heels mute and jealously
watchful in attendance on him. Mindful of Mistress Weaver’s loquacious
confidences, Cadfael looked from the scarred and swollen feet to the chafed
neck. Within the collar of his plain dark coat the votary had wound a length of
linen cloth, to alleviate the rubbing of the thin cord from which a heavy cross
of iron, chaced in a leaf pattern with what looked like gold, hung down upon
his breast. By the look of the seam of red that marked the linen, either this
padding was new, or else it had not been effective. The cord was mercilessly
thin, the cross certainly heavy. To what desperate end could a young man choose
so to torture himself? And what pleasure did he think it could give to God or
Saint Winifred to contemplate his discomfort? Eyes feverishly bright scanned him. A low
voice asked: “You are Brother Cadfael? That is the name Brother Hospitaller
gave me. He said you would have ointments and salves that could be of help to
me. So far,” he added, eyeing Cadfael with glittering fixity, “as there is any
help anywhere for me.” Cadfael gave him a considering look for
that, but asked nothing until he had marshalled the pair of them into his
workshop and sat the sufferer down to be inspected with due care. The young man
Matthew took up his stand beside the open door, careful to avoid blocking the
light, but would not come further within. “You’ve come a fairish step unshod,” said
Cadfael, on his knees to examine the damage. “Was such cruelty needful?” “It was. I do not hate myself so much as
to bear this to no purpose.” The silent youth by the door stirred slightly, but
said no word. “I am under vow,” said his companion, “and will not break it.” It
seemed that he felt a need to account for himself, forestalling questioning.
“My name is Ciaran, I am of a Welsh mother, and I am going back to where I was
born, there to end my life as I began it. You see the wounds on my feet,
brother, but what most ails me does not show anywhere upon me. I have a fell
disease, no threat to any other, but it must shortly end me.” And it could be true, thought Cadfael,
busy with a cleansing oil on the swollen soles, and the toes cut by gravel and
stones. The feverish fire of the deep-set eyes might well mean an even fiercer
fire within. True, the young body, now eased in repose, was well-made and had
not lost flesh, but that was no sure proof of health. Ciaran’s voice remained
low, level and firm. If he knew he had his death, he had come to terms with it. “So I am returning in penitential
pilgrimage, for my soul’s health, which is of greater import. Barefoot and
burdened I shall walk to the house of canons at Aberdaron, so that after my
death I may be buried on the holy isle of Ynys Enlli, where the soil is made up
of the bones and dust of thousands upon thousands of saints.” “I should have thought,” said Cadfael
mildly, “that such a privilege could be earned by going there shod and tranquil
and humble, like any other man.” But for all that, it was an understandable
ambition for a devout man of Welsh extraction, knowing his end near. Aberdaron,
at the tip of the Lleyn peninsula, fronting the wild sea and the holiest island
of the Welsh church, had been the last resting place of many, and the
hospitality of the canons of the house was never refused to any man. “I would
not cast doubt on your sacrifice, but self-imposed suffering seems to me a kind
of arrogance, and not humility.” “It may be so,” said Ciaran remotely. “No
help for it now, I am bound.” “That is true,” said Matthew from his
corner by the door. A measured and yet an abrupt voice, deeper than his
companion’s. “Fast bound! So are we both, I no less than he.” “Hardly by the same vows,” said Cadfael
drily. For Matthew wore good, solid shoes, a little down at heel, but proof
against the stones of the road. “No, not the same. But no less binding.
And I do not forget mine, any more than he forgets his.” Cadfael laid down the foot he had
anointed, setting a folded cloth under it, and lifted its fellow into his lap.
“God forbid I should tempt any man to break his oath. You will both do as you
must do. But at least you may rest your feet here until after the feast, which
will give you three days for healing, and here within the pale the ground is
not so harsh. And once healed, I have a rough spirit that will help to harden
your soles for when you take to the road again. Why not, unless you have
forsworn all help from men? And since you came to me, I take it you have not
yet gone so far. There, sit a while longer, and let that dry.” He rose from his knees, surveying his work
critically, and turned his attention next to the linen wrapping about Ciaran’s
neck. He laid both hands gently on the cord by which the cross depended, and
made to lift it over the young man’s head. “No, no, let be!” It was a soft, wild cry
of alarm, and Ciaran clutched at cross and cord, one with either hand, and
hugged his burden to him fiercely. “Don’t touch it! Let it be!” “Surely,” said Cadfael, startled, “you may
lift it off while I dress the wound it’s cost you? Hardly a moment’s work, why
not?” “No!” Ciaran fastened both hands upon the
cross and hugged it to his breast. “No, never for a moment, night or day! No!
Let it alone!” “Lift it, then,” said Cadfael resignedly,
“and hold it while I dress this cut. No, never fear, I’ll not cheat you. Only
let me unwind this cloth, and see what damage you have there, hidden.” “Yet he should doff it, and so I have
prayed him constantly,” said Matthew softly. “How else can he be truly rid of
his pains?” Cadfael unwound the linen, viewed the
scored line of half-dried blood, still oozing, and went to work on it with a
stinging lotion first to clean it of dust and fragments of frayed skin, and
then with a healing ointment of cleavers. He refolded the cloth, and wound it
carefully under the cord. “There, you have not broken faith. Settle your load
again. If you hold up the weight in your hands as you go, and loosen it in your
bed, you’ll be rid of your gash before you depart.” It seemed to him that they were both of
them in haste to leave him, for the one set his feet tenderly to ground as soon
as he was released, holding up the weight of his cross obediently with both
hands, and the other stepped out through the doorway into the sunlit garden,
and waited on guard for his friend to emerge. The one owed no special thanks,
the other offered only the merest acknowledgement. “But I would remind you both,” said
Cadfael, and with a thoughtful eye on both, “that you are now present at the
feast of a saint who has worked many miracles, even to the defiance of death.
One who may have life itself within her gift,” he said strongly, “even for a
man already condemned to death. Bear it in mind, for she may be listening now!” They said never a word, neither did they
look at each other. They stared back at him from the scented brightness of the
garden with startled, wary eyes, and then they turned abruptly as one man, and
limped and strode away. Chapter Four THERE WAS SO SHORT an interval, and so
little weeding done, before the second pair appeared, that Cadfael could not
choose but reason that the two couples must have met at the corner of his
herber, and perhaps exchanged at least a friendly word or two, since they had
travelled side by side the last miles of their road here. The girl walked solicitously beside her
brother, giving him the smoothest part of the path, and keeping a hand
supportingly under his left elbow, ready to prop him at need, but barely
touching. Her face was turned constantly towards him, eager and loving. If he
was the tended darling, and she the healthy beast of burden, certainly she had
no quarrel with the division. Though just once she did look back over her shoulder,
with a different, a more tentative smile. She was neat and plain in her
homespun country dress, her hair austerely braided, but her face was vivid and
glowing as a rose, and her movements, even at her brother’s pace, had a spring
and grace to them that spoke of a high and ardent spirit. She was fair for a
Welsh girl, her hair a coppery gold, her brows darker, arched hopefully above
wide blue eyes. Mistress Weaver could not be far out in supposing that a young
man who had hefted this neat little woman out of harm’s way in his arms might
well remember the experience with pleasure, and not be averse to repeating it.
If he could take his eyes from his fellow-pilgrim long enough to attempt it! The boy came leaning heavily on his
crutches, his right leg dangling inertly, turned with the toe twisted inward,
and barely brushing the ground. If he could have stood erect he would have been
a hand’s-breadth taller than his sister, but thus hunched he looked even
shorter. Yet the young body was beautifully proportioned, Cadfael judged,
watching his approach with a thoughtful eye, wide-shouldered, slim-flanked, the
one good leg long, vigorous and shapely. He carried little flesh, indeed he
could have done with more, but if he spent his days habitually in pain it was
unlikely he had much appetite. Cadfael’s study of him had begun at the
twisted foot, and travelling upward, came last to the boy’s face. He was fairer
than the girl, wheat-gold of hair and brows, his thin, smooth face like ivory,
and the eyes that met Cadfael’s were a light, brilliant grey-blue, clear as
crystal between long, dark lashes. It was a very still and tranquil face, one
that had learned patient endurance, and expected to have need of it lifelong.
It was clear to Cadfael, in that first exchange of glances, that Rhun did not
look for any miraculous deliverance, whatever Mistress Weaver’s hopes might be. “If you please,” said the girl shyly, “I
have brought my brother, as my aunt said I should. And his name is Rhun, and
mine is Melangell.” “She has told me about you,” said Cadfael,
beckoning them with him towards his workshop. “A long journey you’ve had of it.
Come within, and let’s make you as easy as we may, while I take a look at this
leg of yours. Was there ever an injury brought this on? A fall, or a kick from
a horse? Or a bout of the bone-fever?” He settled the boy on the long bench,
took the crutches from him and laid them aside, and turned him so that he could
stretch out his legs at rest. The boy, with grave eyes steady on
Cadfael’s face, slowly shook his head. “No such accident,” he said in a man’s
low, clear voice. “It came. I think, slowly, but I don’t remember a time before
it. They say I began to falter and fall when I was three or four years old.” Melangell, hesitant in the doorway—strangely
like Ciaran’s attendant shadow, thought Cadfael—had her chin on her shoulder
now, and turned almost hastily to say: “Rhun will tell you all his case. He’ll
be better private with you. I’ll come back later, and wait on the seat outside
there until you need me.” Rhun’s light, bright eyes, transparent as
sunlit ice, smiled at her warmly over Cadfael’s shoulder. “Do go,” he said. “So
fine and sunny a day, you should make good use of it, without me dangling about
you.” She gave him a long, anxious glance, but
half her mind was already away; and satisfied that he was in good hands, she
made her hasty reverence, and fled. They were left looking at each other,
strangers still, and yet in tentative touch. “She goes to find Matthew,” said Rhun
simply, confident of being understood. “He was good to her. And to me,
also—once he carried me the last piece of the way to our night’s lodging on his
back. She likes him, and he would like her, if he could truly see her, but he
seldom sees anyone but Ciaran.” This blunt simplicity might well get him
the reputation of an innocent, though that would be the world’s mistake. What
he saw, he said—provided, Cadfael hoped, he had already taken the measure of
the person to whom he spoke—and he saw more than most, having so much more need
to observe and record, to fill up the hours of his day. “They were here?” asked Rhun, shifting
obediently to allow Cadfael to strip down the long hose from his hips and his
maimed leg. “They were here. Yes, I know.” “I would like her to be happy.” “She has it in her to be very happy,” said
Cadfael, answering in kind, almost without his will. The boy had a quality of
dazzle about him that made unstudied answers natural, almost inevitable. There
had been, he thought, the slightest of stresses on ‘her’. Rhun had little
enough expectation that he could ever be happy, but he wanted happiness for his
sister. “Now pay heed,” said Cadfael, bending to his own duties, “for this is
important. Close your eyes, and be at ease as far as you can, and tell me where
I find a spot that gives pain. First, thus at rest, is there any pain now?” Docilely Rhun closed his eyes and waited,
breathing softly. “No, I am quite easy now.” Good, for all his sinews lay loose and
trustful, and at least in that state he felt no pain. Cadfael began to finger
his way, at first very gently and soothingly, all down the thigh and calf of
the helpless leg, probing and manipulating. Thus stretched out at rest, the
twisted limb partially regained its proper alignment, and showed fairly formed,
though much wasted by comparison with the left, and marred by the intumed toe
and certain tight, bunched knots of sinew in the calf. He sought out these, and
let his fingers dig deep there, wrestling with hard tissue. “There I feel it,” said Rhun, breathing
deep. “It doesn’t feel like pain—yes, it hurts, but not for crying. A good
hurt…” Brother Cadfael oiled his hands, smoothed
a palm over the shrunken calf, and went to work with firm fingertips, working
tendons unexercised for years, beyond that tensed touch of toe upon ground. He
was gentle and slow, feeling for the hard cores of resistance. There were
unnatural tensions there, that would not melt to him yet. He let his fingers
work softly, and his mind probe elsewhere. “You were orphaned early. How long have
you been with your Aunt Weaver?” “Seven years now,” said Rhun almost
drowsily, soothed by the circling fingers. “I know we are a burden to her, but
she never says it, nor she would never let any other say it. She has a good
business, but small, it provides her needs and keeps two men at work, but she
is not rich. Melangell works hard keeping the house and the kitchen, and earns
her keep. I have learned to weave, but I am slow at it. I can neither stand for
long nor sit for long, I am no profit to her. But she never speaks of it, for
all she has an edge to her tongue when she pleases.” “She would,” agreed Cadfael peacefully. “A
woman with many cares is liable to be short in her speech now and again, and no
ill meant. She has brought you here for a miracle. You know that? Why else
would you all three have walked all this way, measuring out the stages day by
day at your pace? And yet I think you have no expectation of grace. Do you not
believe Saint Winifred can do wonders?” “I?” The boy was startled, he opened great
eyes clearer than the clear waters Cadfael had navigated long ago, in the
eastern fringes of the Midland Sea, over pale and glittering sand. “Oh, you
mistake me, I do believe. But why for me? In case like mine we come by our
thousands, in worse case by the hundred. How dare I ask to be among the first?
Besides, what I have I can bear. There are some who cannot bear what they have.
The saint will know where to choose. There is no reason her choice should fall
on me.” “Then why did you consent to come?”
Cadfael asked. Rhun turned his head aside, and eyelids
blue-veined like the petals of anemones veiled his eyes. “They wished it, I did
what they wanted. And there was Melangell…” Yes, Melangell who was altogether comely
and bright and a charm to the eye, thought Cadfael. Her brother knew her
dowryless, and wished her a little of joy and a decent marriage, and there at
home, working hard in house and kitchen, and known for a penniless niece,
suitors there were none. A venture so far upon the roads, to mingle with so
various a company, might bring forth who could tell what chances? In moving Rhun had plucked at a nerve that
gripped and twisted him, he eased himself back against the timber wall with
aching care. Cadfael drew up the homespun hose over the boy’s nakedness,
knotted him decent, and gently drew down his feet, the sound and the crippled,
to the beaten earth floor. “Come again to me tomorrow, after High
Mass, for I think I can help you, if only a little. Now sit until I see if that
sister of yours is waiting, and if not, you may rest easy until she comes. And
I’ll give you a single draught to take this night when you go to your bed. It
will ease your pain and help you to sleep.” The girl was there, still and solitary
against the sun-warmed wall, the brightness of her face clouded over, as though
some eager expectation had turned into a grey disappointment; but at the sight
of Rhun emerging she rose with a resolute smile for him, and her voice was as
gay and heartening as ever as they moved slowly away. He had an opportunity to study all of them
next day at High Mass, when doubtless his mind should have been on higher
things, but obstinately would not rise above the quivering crest of Mistress
Weaver’s head-cloth, and the curly dark crown of Matthew’s thick crop of hair.
Almost all the inhabitants of the guest-halls, the gentles who had separate
apartments as well as the male and female pilgrims who shared the two common
dortoirs, came in their best to this one office of the day, whatever they did with
the rest of it. Mistress Weaver paid devout attention to every word of the
office, and several times nudged Melangell sharply in the ribs to recall her to
duty, for as often as not her head was turned sidewise, and her gaze directed
rather at Matthew than at the altar. No question but her fancy, if not her
whole heart, was deeply engaged there. As for Matthew, he stood at Ciaran’s
shoulder, always within touch. But twice at least he looked round, and his
brooding eyes rested, with no change of countenance, upon Melangell. Yet on the
one occasion when their glances met, it was Matthew who turned abruptly away. That young man, thought Cadfael, aware of
the broken encounter of eyes, has a thing to do which no girl must be allowed
to hinder or spoil: to get his fellow safely to his journey’s end at Aberdaron. He was already a celebrated figure in the
enclave, this Ciaran. There was nothing secret about him, he spoke freely and
humbly of himself. He had been intended for ordination, but had not yet gone
beyond the first step as sub-deacon, and had not reached, and now never would
reach, the tonsure. Brother Jerome, always a man to insinuate himself as close
as might be to any sign of superlative virtue and holiness, had cultivated and
questioned him, and freely retailed what he had learned to any of the brothers
who would listen. The story of Ciaran’s mortal sickness and penitential
pilgrimage home to Aberdaron was known to all. The austerities he practised
upon himself made a great impression. Brother Jerome held that the house was
honoured in receiving such a man. And indeed that lean, passionate face,
burning-eyed beneath the uncropped brown hair, had a vehement force and
fervour. Rhun could not kneel, but stood steady and
stoical on his crutches throughout the office, his eyes fixed, wide and bright,
upon the altar. In this soft, dim light within, already reflecting from every
stone surface the muted brightness of a cloudless day outside, Cadfael saw that
the boy was beautiful, the planes of his face as suave and graceful as any
girl’s, the curving of his fair hair round ears and cheeks angelically pure and
chaste. If the woman with no son of her own doted on him, and was willing to
forsake her living for a matter of weeks on the off-chance of a miracle that would
heal him, who could wonder at her? Since both his attention and his eyes were
straying, Cadfael gave up the struggle and let them stray at large over all
those devout heads, gathered in a close assembly and filling the nave of the
church. An important pilgrimage has much of the atmosphere of a public fair
about it, and brings along with it all the hangers-on who frequent such
occasions, the pickpockets, the plausible salesmen of relics, sweetmeats,
remedies, the fortune-tellers, the gamblers, the swindlers and cheats of all
kinds. And some of these cultivate the most respectable of appearances, and
prefer to work from within the pale rather than set up in the Foregate as at a
market. It was always worth running an eye over the ranks within, as Hugh’s sergeants
were certainly doing along the ranks without, to mark down probable sources of
trouble before ever the trouble began. This congregation certainly looked
precisely what it purported to be. Nevertheless, there were a few there worth a
second glance. Three modest, unobtrusive tradesmen who had arrived closely one
after another and rapidly and openly made acquaintance, to all appearances
until then strangers: Walter Bagot, glover; John Shure, tailor; William Hales,
farrier. Small craftsmen making this their summer holiday, and modestly out to
enjoy it. And why not? Except that Cadfael had noted the tailor’s hands
devoutly folded, and observed that he cultivated the long, well-tended nails of
a fairground sharper, hardly suitable for a tailor’s work. He made a mental
note of their faces, the glover rounded and glossy, as if oiled with the same
dressing he used on his leathers, the tailor lean-jowled and sedate, with lank
hair curtaining a lugubrious face, the farrier square, brown and twinkling of
eye, the picture of honest good-humour. They might be what they claimed. They
might not. Hugh would be on the watch, so would the careful tavern-keepers of
the Foregate and the town, by no means eager to hold their doors open to the
fleecers and skinners of their own neighbours and customers. Cadfael went out from Mass with his
brethren, very thoughtful, and found Rhun already waiting for him in the
herbarium. The boy sat passive and submitted himself
to Cadfael’s handling, saying no word beyond his respectful greeting. The
rhythm of the questing fingers, patiently coaxing apart the rigid tissues that
lamed him, had a soothing effect, even when they probed deeply enough to cause
pain. He let his head lean back against the timbers of the wall, and his eyes
gradually closed. The tension of his cheeks and lips showed that he was not
sleeping, but Cadfael was able to study the boy’s face closely as he worked on
him, and note his pallor, and the dark rings round his eyes. “Well, did you take the dose I gave you
for the night?” asked Cadfael, guessing at the answer. “No.” Rhun opened his eyes apprehensively,
to see if he was to be reproved for it, but Cadfael’s face showed neither
surprise nor reproach. “Why not?” “I don’t know. Suddenly I felt there was
no need. I was happy,” said Rhun, his eyes again closed, the better to examine
his own actions and motives. “I had prayed. It’s not that I doubt the saint’s
power. Suddenly it seemed to me that I need not even wish to be healed… that I
ought to offer up my lameness and pain freely, not as a price for favour.
People bring offerings, and I have nothing else to offer. Do you think it might
be acceptable? I meant it humbly.” There could hardly be, thought Cadfael,
among all her devotees, a more costly oblation. He has gone far along a
difficult road who has come to the point of seeing that deprivation, pain and
disability are of no consequence at all, beside the inward conviction of grace,
and the secret peace of the soul. An acceptance which can only be made for a
man’s own self, never for any other. Another’s grief is not to be tolerated, if
there can be anything done to alleviate it. “And did you sleep well?” “No. But it didn’t matter. I lay quiet all
night long. I tried to bear it gladly. And I was not the only one there wakeful.”
He slept in the common dormitory for the men, and there must be several among
his fellows there afflicted in one way or another, besides the sick and
possibly contagious whom Brother Edmund had isolated in the infirmary. “Ciaran
was restless, too,” said Rhun reflectively, “When it was all silent, after
Lauds, he got up very quietly from his cot, trying not to disturb anyone, and
started wards the door. I thought then how strange it was that he took his belt
and scrip with him…” Cadfael was listening intently enough by
this time. Why, indeed, if a man merely needed relief for his body during the
night, should he burden himself with carrying his possessions about with him?
Though the habit of being wary of theft, in such shared accommodation, might
persist even when half-asleep, and in monastic care into the bargain. “Did he so, indeed? And what followed?” “Matthew has his own pallet drawn close
beside Ciaran’s, even in the night he lies with a hand stretched out to touch.
Besides, you know, he seems to know by instinct whatever ails Ciaran. He rose
up in an instant, and reached out and took Ciaran by the arm. And Ciaran
started and gasped, and blinked round at him, like a man startled awake
suddenly, and whispered that he’d been asleep and dreaming, and had dreamed it
was time to start out on the road again. So then Matthew took the scrip from
him and laid it aside, and they both lay down in their beds again, and all was
quiet as before. But I don’t think Ciaran slept well, even after that, his
dream had disturbed his mind too much, I heard him twisting and turning for a
long time.” “Did they know,” asked Cadfael, “that you
were also awake, and had heard what passed?” “I can’t tell. I made no pretence, and the
pain was bad, I think they must have heard me shifting… I couldn’t help it. But
of course I made no sign, it would have been discourteous.” So it passed as a dream, perhaps for the
benefit of Rhun, or any other who might be wakeful as he was. True enough, a
sick man troubled by night might very well rise by stealth to leave his friend
in peace, out of consideration. But then, if he needed ease, he would have been
forced to explain himself and go, when his friend nevertheless started awake to
restrain him. Instead, he had pleaded a deluding dream, and lain down again.
And men rousing in dreams do move silently, almost as if by stealth. It could
be, it must be, simply what it seemed. “You travelled some miles of the way with
those two, Rhun. How did you all fare together on the road? You must have got
to know them as well as any here.” “It was their being slow, like us, that
kept us all together, after my sister was nearly ridden down, and Matthew ran
and caught her up and leaped the ditch with her. They were just slowly
overtaking us then, after that we went on all together for company. But I
wouldn’t say we got to know them—they are so rapt in each other. And then,
Ciaran was in pain, and that kept him silent, though he did tell us where he
was bound, and why. It’s true Melangell and Matthew took to walking last,
behind us, and he carried our few goods for her, having so little of his own to
carry. I never wondered at Ciaran being so silent,” said Rhun simply, “seeing
what he had to bear. And my Aunt Alice can talk for two,” he ended guilelessly. So she could, and no doubt did, all the
rest of the way into Shrewsbury. “That pair, Ciaran and Matthew,” said
Cadfael, still delicately probing, “they never told you how they came together?
Whether they were kin, or friends, or had simply met and kept company on the road?
For they’re much of an age, even of a kind, young men of some schooling, I
fancy, bred to clerking or squiring, and yet not kin, or don’t acknowledge it,
and after their fashion very differently made. A man wonders how they ever came
to be embarked together on this journey. It was south of Warwick when you met
them? I wonder from how far south they came.” “They never spoke of such things,” owned
Rhun, himself considering them for the first time. “It was good to have company
on the way, one stout young man at least. The roads can be perilous for two
women, with only a cripple like me. But now you speak of it, no, we did not
learn much of where they came from, or what bound them together. Unless my
sister knows more. There were days,” said Rhun, shifting to assist Brother
Cadfael’s probings into the sinews of his thigh, “when she and Matthew grew
quite easy and talkative behind us.” Cadfael doubted whether the subject of
their conversation then had been anything but their two selves, brushing
sleeves pleasurably along the summer highways, she in constant recall of the
moment when she was snatched up bodily and swung across the ditch against
Matthew’s heart, he in constant contemplation of the delectable creature
dancing at his elbow, and recollection of the feel of her slight, warm,
frightened weight on his breast. “But he’ll hardly look at her now,” said
Rhun regretfully. “He’s too intent on Ciaran, and Melangell will come between.
But it costs him a dear effort to turn away from her, all the same.” Cadfael stroked down the misshapen leg,
and rose to scrub his oily hands. “There, that’s enough for today. But sit
quiet a while and rest before you go. And will you take the draught tonight? At
least keep it by you, and do what you feel to be right and best. But remember
it’s a kindness sometimes to accept help, a kindness to the giver. Would you
wilfully inflict torment on yourself as Ciaran does? No, not you, you are too
modest by far to set yourself up for braver and more to be worshipped than
other men. So never think you do wrong by sparing yourself discomfort. Yet it’s
your choice, make it as you see fit.” When the boy took up his crutches again
and tapped his way out along the path towards the great court, Cadfael followed
him at a distance, to watch his progress without embarrassing him. He could
mark no change as yet. The stretched toe still barely dared touch ground, and
still turned inward. And yet the sinews, cramped as they were, had some small
force in them, instead of being withered and atrophied as he would have
expected. If I had him here long enough, he thought, I could bring back some
ease and use into that leg. But he’ll go as he came. In three days now all will
be over, the festival ended for this year, the guest-hall emptying. Ciaran and
his guardian shadow will pass on northwards and westwards into Wales, and Dame
Weaver will take her chicks back home to Campden. And those two, who might very
well have made a fair match if things had been otherwise, will go their
separate ways, and never see each other again. It’s in the nature of things
that those who gather in great numbers for the feasts of the church should also
disperse again to their various duties afterwards. Still, they need not all go
away unchanged. Chapter Five BROTHER ADAM OF READING, being lodged in
the dortoir with the monks of the house, had had leisure to observe his fellow
pilgrims of the guest-hall only at the offices of the church, and in their
casual comings and goings about the precinct; and it happened that he came from
the garden towards midafternoon, with Cadfael beside him, just as Ciaran and
Matthew were crossing the court towards the cloister garth, there to sit in the
sun for an hour or two before Vespers. There were plenty of others, monks, lay
servants and guests, busy on their various occasions, but Ciaran’s striking
figure and painfully slow and careful gait marked him out for notice. “Those two,” said Brother Adam, halting,
“I have seen before. At Abington, where I spent the first night after leaving
Reading. They were lodged there the same night.” “At Abingdon!” Cadfael echoed
thoughtfully. “So they came from far south. You did not cross them again after
Abingdon, on the way here?” “It was not likely. I was mounted. And
then, I had my abbot’s mission to Leominster, which took me out of the direct
way. No, I saw no more of them, never until now. But they can hardly be
mistaken, once seen.” “In what sort of case were they at
Abingdon?” asked Cadfael, his eyes following the two inseparable figures until
they vanished into the cloister. “Would you say they had been long on the road
before that night’s halt? The man is pledged to go barefoot to Aberdaron, it
would not take many miles to leave the mark on him.” “He was going somewhat lamely, even then.
They had both the dust of the roads on them. It might have been their first
day’s walking that ended there, but I doubt it.” “He came to me to have his feet tended,
yesterday,” said Cadfael, “and I must see him again before evening. Two or
three days of rest will set him up for the next stage of his walk. From more
than a day’s going south of Abingdon to the remotest tip of Wales, a long, long
walk. A strange, even a mistaken, piety it seems to me, to take upon oneself
ostentatious pains, when there are poor fellows enough in the world who are
born to pain they have not chosen, and carry it with humility.” “The simple believe it brings merit,” said
Brother Adam tolerantly. “It may be he has no other claim upon outstanding
virtue, and clutches at this.” “But he’s no simple soul,” said Cadfael
with conviction, “whatever he may be. He has, he tells me, a mortal disease,
and is going to end his days in blessedness and peace at Aberdaron, and have
his bones laid in Ynys Enlli, which is a noble ambition in a man of Welsh
blood. The voluntary assumption of pain beyond his doom may even be a pennon of
defiance, a wag of the hand against death. That I could understand. But I would
not approve it.” “It’s very natural you should frown on
it,” agreed Adam, smiling indulgence upon his companion and himself alike,
“seeing you are schooled to the alleviation of pain, and feel it to be a
violator and an enemy. By the very virtue of these plants we have learned to
use.” He patted the leather scrip at his girdle, and the soft rustle of seeds
within answered him. They had been sorting over Cadfael’s clay saucers of new
seed from this freshly ripening year, and he had helped himself to two or three
not native in his own herbarium. “It is as good a dragon to fight as any in
this world, pain.” They had gone some yards more towards the
stone steps that led up to the main door of the guest-hall, in no hurry, and
taking pleasure in the contemplation of so much bustle and motion, when Brother
Adam checked abruptly and stood at gaze. “Well, well, I think you may have got some
of our southern sinners, as well as our would-be saints!” Cadfael, surprised, followed where Adam
was gazing, and stood to hear what further he would have to say, for the
individual in question was the least remarkable of men at first glance. He
stood close to the gatehouse, one of a small group constantly on hand there to
watch the new arrivals and the general commerce of the day. A big man, but so
neatly and squarely built that his size was not wholly apparent, he stood with
his thumbs in the belt of his plain but ample gown, which was nicely cut and
fashioned to show him no nobleman, and no commoner, either, but a solid,
respectable, comfortably provided fellow of the middle kind, merchant or
tradesman. One of those who form the backbone of many a township in England,
and can afford the occasional pilgrimage by way of a well-earned holiday. He
gazed benignly upon the activity around him from a plump, shrewd, well-shaven
face, favouring the whole creation with a broad, contented smile. “That,” said Cadfael, eyeing his companion
with bright enquiry, “is, or so I am informed, one Simeon Poer, a merchant of
Guildford, come on pilgrimage for his soul’s sake, and because the summer
chances to be very fine and inviting. And why not? Do you know of a reason?” “Simeon Poer may well be his name,” said
Brother Adam, “or he may have half a dozen more ready to trot forward at need.
I never knew a name for him, but his face and form I do know. Father Abbot uses
me a good deal on his business outside the cloister and I have occasion to know
most of the fairs and markets in our shire and beyond. I’ve seen that
fellow—not gowned like a provost, as he is now, I grant you, but by the look of
him he’s been doing well lately—round every fairground, cultivating the company
of those young, green roisterers who frequent every such gathering. For the
contents of their pockets, surely. Most likely, dice. Even more likely, loaded
dice. Though I wouldn’t say he might not pick a pocket here and there, if
business was bad. A quicker means to the same end, if a riskier.” So knowing and practical a brother Cadfael
had not encountered for some years among the innocents. Plainly Brother Adam’s
frequent sallies out of the cloister on the abbot’s business had broadened his
horizons. Cadfael regarded him with respect and warmth, and turned to study the
smiling, benevolent merchant more closely. “You’re sure of him?” “Sure that he’s the same man, yes. Sure
enough of his practices to challenge him openly, no, hardly, since he has never
yet been taken up but once, and then he proved so slippery he slithered through
the bailiffs fingers. But keep a weather eye on him, and this may be where
he’ll make the slip every rogue makes in the end, and get his comeuppance.” “If you’re right,” said Cadfael, “has he
not strayed rather far from his own haunts? In my experience, from years back I
own, his kind seldom left the region where they knew their way about better
than the bailiffs. Has he made the south country so hot for him that he must run
for a fresh territory? That argues something worse than cheating at dice.” Brother Adam hoisted dubious shoulders.
“It could be. Some of our scum have found the disorders of faction very
profitable, in their own way, just as their lords and masters have in theirs.
Battles are not for them—far too dangerous to their own skins. But the brawls
that blow up in towns where uneasy factions come together are meat and drink to
them. Pockets to be picked, riots to be started—discreetly from the
rear—unoffending elders who look prosperous to be knocked on the head or knifed
from behind or have their purse-strings cut in the confusion… Safer and easier
than taking to the woods and living wild for prey, as their kind do in the
country.” Just such gatherings, thought Cadfael, as
that at Winchester, where at least one man was knifed in the back and left
dying. Might not the law in the south be searching for this man, to drive him
so far from his usual hunting-grounds? For some worse offence than cheating
silly young men of their money at dice? Something as black as murder itself? “There are two or three others in the
common guest-hall,” he said, “about whom I have my doubts, but this man has had
no truck with them so far as I’ve seen. But I’ll bear it in mind, and keep a watchful
eye open, and have Brother Denis do the same. And I’ll mention what you say to
Hugh Beringar, too, before this evening’s out. Both he and the town provost
will be glad to have fair warning.” Since Ciaran was sitting quietly in the
cloister garth, it seemed a pity he should be made to walk through the gardens
to the herbarium, when Cadfael’s broad brown feet were in excellent condition,
and sensibly equipped with stout sandals. So Cadfael fetched the salve he had
used on Ciaran’s wounds and bruises, and the spirit that would brace and
toughen his tender soles, and brought them to the cloister. It was pleasant
there in the afternoon sun, and the turf was thick and springy and cool to bare
feet. The roses were coming into full bloom, and their scent hung in the warm
air like a benediction. But two such closed and sunless faces! Was the one
truly condemned to an early death, and the other to lose and mourn so close a
friend? Ciaran was speaking as Cadfael approached,
and did not at first notice him, but even when he was aware of the visitor
bearing down on them he continued steadily to the end, “… you do but waste your
time, for it will not happen. Nothing will be changed, don’t look for it.
Never! You might far better leave me and go home.” Did the one of them believe in Saint
Winifred’s power, and pray and hope for a miracle? And was the other, the sick
man, all too passionately of Rhun’s mind, and set on offering his early death
as an acceptable and willing sacrifice, rather than ask for healing? Matthew had not yet noticed Cadfael’s
approach. His deep voice, measured and resolute, said just audibly, “Save your
breath! For I will go with you, step for step, to the very end.” Then Cadfael was close, and they were both
aware of him, and stirred defensively out of their private anguish, heaving in
breath and schooling their faces to confront the outer world decently. They
drew a little apart on the stone bench, welcoming Cadfael with somewhat
strained smiles. “I saw no need to make you come to me,”
said Cadfael, dropping to his knees and opening his scrip in the bright green
turf, “when I am better able to come to you. So sit and be easy, and let me see
how much work is yet to be done before you can go forth in good heart.” “This is kind, brother,” said Ciaran,
rousing himself with a sigh. “Be assured that I do go in good heart, for my
pilgrimage is short and my arrival assured.” At the other end of the bench Matthew’s
voice said softly, “Amen!” After that it was all silence as Cadfael
anointed the swollen soles, kneading spirit vigorously into the misused skin,
surely heretofore accustomed always to going well shod, and soothed the
ointment of cleavers into the healing grazes. “There! Keep off your feet through
tomorrow, but for such offices as you feel you must attend. Here there’s no
need to go far. And I’ll come to you tomorrow and have you fit to stand
somewhat longer the next day, when the saint is brought home.” When he spoke of
her now, he hardly knew whether he was truly speaking of the mortal substance
of Saint Winifred, which was generally believed to be in that silver-chaced
reliquary, or of some hopeful distillation of her spirit which could fill with
sanctity even an empty coffin, even a casket containing pitiful, faulty human
bones, unworthy of her charity, but subject, like all mortality, to the
capricious, smiling mercies of those above and beyond question. If you could
reason by pure logic for the occurrence of miracles, they would not be
miracles, would they? He scrubbed his hands on a handful of
wool, and rose from his knees. In some twenty minutes or so it would be time
for Vespers. He had taken his leave, and almost reached
the archway into the great court, when he heard rapid steps at his heels, a
hand reached deprecatingly for his sleeve, and Matthew’s voice said in his ear,
“Brother Cadfael, you left this lying.” It was his jar of ointment, of rough,
greenish pottery, almost invisible in the grass. The young man held it out in
the palm of a broad, strong, workmanlike hand, long-fingered and elegant. Dark
eyes, reserved but earnestly curious, searched Cadfael’s face. Cadfael took the jar with thanks, and put
it away in his scrip. Ciaran sat where Matthew had left him, his face and
burning gaze turned towards them; they stood at a distance, between him and the
outer day, and he had, for one moment, the look of a soul abandoned to absolute
solitude in a populous world. Cadfael and Matthew stood gazing in
speculation and uncertainty into each other’s eyes. This was that able, ready
young man who had leaped into action at need, upon whom Melangell had fixed her
young, unpractised heart, and to whom Rhun had surely looked for a hopeful way
out for his sister, whatever might become of himself. Good, cultivated stock,
surely, bred of some small gentry and taught a little Latin as well as his
schooling in arms. How, except by the compulsion of inordinate love, did this
one come to be ranging the country like a penniless vagabond, without root or
attachment but to a dying man? “Tell me truth,” said Cadfael. “Is it
indeed true—is it certain—that Ciaran goes this way towards his death?” There was a brief moment of silence, as
Matthew’s wide-set eyes grew larger and darker. Then he said very softly and
deliberately, “It is truth. He is already marked for death. Unless your saint
has a miracle for us, there is nothing can save him. Or me!” he ended abruptly,
and wrenched himself away to return to his devoted watch. Cadfael turned his back on supper in the
refectory, and set off instead along the Foregate towards the town. Over the
bridge that spanned the Severn, in through the gate, and up the curving slope
of the Wyle to Hugh Beringar’s town house. There he sat and nursed his godson
Giles, a large, comely, self-willed child, fair like his mother, and long of limb,
some day to dwarf his small, dark, sardonic father. Aline brought food and wine
for her husband and his friend, and then sat down to her needlework, favouring
her menfolk from time to time with a smiling glance of serene contentment. When
her son fell asleep in Cadfael’s lap she rose and lifted the boy away gently.
He was heavy for her, but she had learned how to carry him lightly balanced on
arm and shoulder. Cadfael watched her fondly as she bore the child away into
the next room to his bed, and closed the door between. “How is it possible that that girl can
grow every day more radiant and lovely? I’ve known marriage rub the fine bloom
off many a handsome maid. Yet it suits her as a halo does a saint.” “Oh, there’s something to be said for
marriage,” said Hugh idly. “Do I look so poorly on it? Though it’s an odd study
for a man of your habit, after all these years of celibacy… And all the
stravagings about the world before that! You can’t have thought too highly of
the wedded state, or you’d have ventured on it yourself. You took no vows until
past forty, and you a well-set-up young fellow crusading all about the east
with the best of them. How do I know you have not an Aline of your own locked
away somewhere, somewhere in your remembrance, as dear as mine is to me?
Perhaps even a Giles of your own,” he added, whimsically smiling, “a Giles God
knows where, grown a man now…” Cadfael’s silence and stillness, though
perfectly easy and complacent, nevertheless sounded a mute warning in Hugh’s
perceptive senses. On the edge of drowsiness among his cushions after a long
day out of doors, he opened a black, considering eye to train upon his friend’s
musing face, and withdrew delicately into practical business. “Well, so this Simeon Poer is known in the
south. I’m grateful to you and to Brother Adam for the nudge, though so far the
man has set no foot wrong here. But these others you’ve pictured for me… At
Wat’s tavern in the Foregate they’ve had practice in marking down strangers who
come with a fair or a feast, and spread themselves large about the town. Wat
tells my people he has a group moving in, very merry, some of them strangers.
They could well be these you name. Some of them, of course, the usual young
fellows of the town and the Foregate with more pence than sense. They’ve been
drinking a great deal, and throwing dice. Wat does not like the way the dice
fall.” “It’s as I supposed,” said Cadfael,
nodding. “For every Mass of ours they’ll be celebrating the Gamblers’ Mass
elsewhere. And by all means let the fools throw their money after their sense,
so the odds be fair. But Wat knows a loaded throw when he sees one.” “He knows how to rid his house of the
plague, too. He has hissed in the ears of one of the strangers that his tavern
is watched, and they’d be wise to take their school out of there. And for
tonight he has a lad on the watch, to find out where they’ll meet. Tomorrow
night we’ll have at them, and rid you of them in good time for the feast day,
if all goes well.” Which would be a very welcome cleansing,
thought Cadfael, making his way back across the bridge in the first limpid
dusk, with the river swirling its coiled currents beneath him in gleams of
reflected light, low summer water leaving the islands outlined in swathes of
drowned, browning weed. But as yet there was nothing to shed light, even by
reflected, phantom gleams, upon that death so far away in the south country,
whence the merchant Simeon Poer had set out. On pilgrimage for his respectable
soul? Or in flight from a law aroused too fiercely for his safety, by something
graver than the cozening of fools? Though Cadfael felt too close to folly
himself to be loftily complacent even about that, however much it might be
argued that gamblers deserved all they got. The great gate of the abbey was closed,
but the wicket in it stood open, shedding sunset light through from the west.
In the mild dazzle Cadfael brushed shoulders and sleeves with another entering,
and was a little surprised to be hoisted deferentially through the wicket by a
firm hand at his elbow. “Give you goodnight, brother!” sang a
mellow voice in his ear, as the returning guest stepped within on his heels.
And the solid, powerful, woollen-gowned form of Simeon Poer, self-styled
merchant of Guildford, rolled vigorously past him, and crossed the great court
to the stone steps of the guest-hall. Chapter Six THEY WERE EMERGING from High Mass on the
morning of the twenty-first day of June, the eve of Saint Winifred’s
translation, stepping out into a radiant morning, when the abbot’s sedate
progress towards his lodging was rudely disrupted by a sudden howl of dismay
among the dispersing multitude of worshippers, a wild ripple of movement
cleaving a path through their ranks, and the emergence of a frantic figure
lurching forth on clumsy, naked feet to clutch at the abbot’s robe, and appeal
in a loud, indignant cry, “Father Abbot, stand my friend and give me justice,
for I am robbed! A thief, there is a thief among us!” The abbot looked down in astonishment and
concern into the face of Ciaran, convulsed and ablaze with resentment and
distress. “Father, I beg you, see justice done! I am
helpless unless you help me!” He awoke, somewhat late, to the
unwarranted violence of his behaviour, and fell on his knees at the abbot’s
feet. “Pardon, pardon! I am too loud and troublous, I hardly know what I say!” The press of gossiping, festive
worshippers just loosed from Mass had fallen quiet all in a moment, and instead
of dispersing drew in about them to listen and stare, avidly curious. The monks
of the house, hindered in their orderly departure, hovered in quiet
deprecation. Cadfael looked beyond the kneeling, imploring figure of Ciaran for
its inseparable twin, and found Matthew just shouldering his way forward out of
the crowd, open-mouthed and wide-eyed in patent bewilderment, to stand at gaze
a few paces apart, and frown helplessly from the abbot to Ciaran and back
again, in search of the cause of this abrupt turmoil. Was it possible that
something had happened to the one that the other of the matched pair did not
know? “Get up!” said Radulfus, erect and calm.
“No need to kneel. Speak out whatever you have to say, and you shall have
right.” The pervasive silence spread, grew, filled
even the most distant reaches of the great court. Those who had already
scattered to the far corners turned and crept unobtrusively back again,
large-eyed and prick-eared, to hang upon the fringes of the crowd already
assembled. Ciaran clambered to his feet, voluble
before he was erect. “Father, I had a ring, the copy of one the lord bishop of
Winchester keeps for his occasions, bearing his device and inscription. Such
copies he uses to afford safe-conduct to those he sends forth on his business
or with his blessing, to open doors to them and provide protection on the road.
Father, the ring is gone!” “This ring was given to you by Henry of
Blois himself?” asked Radulfus. “No, Father, not in person. I was in the
service of the prior of Hyde Abbey, a lay clerk, when this mortal sickness came
on me, and I took this vow of mine to spend my remaining days in the canonry of
Aberdaron. My prior—you know that Hyde is without an abbot, and has been for
some years—my prior asked the lord bishop, of his goodness, to give me what
protection he could for my journey…” So that had been the starting point of
this barefoot journey, thought Cadfael, enlightened. Winchester itself, or as
near as made no matter, for the New Minster of that city, always a jealous
rival of the Old, where Bishop Henry presided, had been forced to abandon its
old home in the city thirty years ago, and banished to Hyde Mead, on the
north-western outskirts. There was no love lost between Henry and the community
at Hyde, for it was the bishop who had been instrumental in keeping them
deprived of an abbot for so long, in pursuit of his own ambition of turning
them into an episcopal monastery. The struggle had been going on for some time,
the bishop deploying various schemes to get the house into his own hands, and
the prior using every means to resist these manipulations. It seemed Henry had
still the grace to show compassion even on a servant of the hostile house, when
he fell under the threat of disease and death. The traveller over whom the
bishop-legate spread his protecting hand would pass unmolested wherever law
retained its validity. Only those irreclaimably outlaw already would dare
interfere with him. “Father, the ring is gone, stolen from me
this very morning. See here, the slashed threads that held it!” Ciaran heaved
forward the drab linen scrip that rode at his belt, and showed two dangling
ends of cord, very cleanly severed. “A sharp knife—someone here has such a
dagger. And my ring is gone!” Prior Robert was at the abbot’s elbow by
then, agitated out of his silvery composure. “Father, what this man says is
true. He showed me the ring. Given to ensure him aid and hospitality on his
journey, which is of most sad and solemn import. If now it is lost, should not
the gate be closed while we enquire?” “Let it be so,” said Radulfus, and stood
silent to see Brother Jerome, ever ready and assiduous on the prior’s heels,
run to see the order carried out. “Now, take breath and thought, for your loss
cannot be lost far. You did not wear the ring, then, but carried it knotted
securely by this cord, within your scrip?” “Yes, Father. It was beyond words precious
to me.” “And when did you last ascertain that it
was still there, and safe?” “Father, this very morning I know I had
it. Such few things as I possess, here they lie before you. Could I fail to see
if this cord had been cut in the night while I slept? It is not so. This
morning all was as I left it last night. I have been bidden to rest, by reason
of my barefoot vow. Today I ventured out only for Mass. Here in the very
church, in this great press of worshippers, some malevolent has broken every
ban, and slashed loose my ring from me.” And indeed, thought Cadfael, running a
considering eye round all the curious, watching faces, it would not be
difficult, in such a press, to find the strings that anchored the hidden ring,
flick it out from its hiding-place, cut the strings and make away with it,
discreetly between crowding bodies, and never be seen by a soul or felt by the
victim. A neat thing, done so privately and expertly that even Matthew, who
missed nothing that touched his friend, had missed this impudent assault. For
Matthew stood there staring, obviously taken by surprise, and unsure as yet how
to take this turn of events. His face was unreadable, closed and still, his
eyes narrowed and bright, darting from face to face as Ciaran or abbot or prior
spoke. Cadfael noted that Melangell had stolen forward close to him, and taken
him hesitantly by the sleeve. He did not shake her off. By the slight lift of
his head and widening of his eyes he knew who had touched him, and he let his
hand feel for hers and clasp it, while his whole attention seemed to be fixed
on Ciaran. Somewhere not far behind them Rhun leaned on his crutches, his fair
face frowning in anxious dismay, Aunt Alice attendant at his shoulder, bright
with curiosity. Here are we all, thought Cadfael, and not one of us knows what
is in any other mind, or who has done what has been done, or what will come of
it for any of those who look on and marvel. “You cannot tell,” suggested Prior Robert,
agitated and grieved, “who stood close to you during the service? If indeed
some ill-conditioned person has so misused the holy office as to commit theft
in the very sacredness of the Mass…” “Father, I was intent only upon the
altar.” Ciaran shook with fervour, holding the ravished scrip open before him
with his sparse possessions bared to be seen. “We were close pressed, so many
people… as is only seemly, in such a shrine… Matthew was close at my back, but
so he ever is. Who else there may have been by me, how can I say? There was no
man nor woman among us who was not hemmed in every way.” “It is truth,” said Prior Robert, who had
been much gratified at the large attendance. “Father, the gate is now closed,
we are all here who were present at Mass. And surely we all have a desire to
see this wrong righted.” “All, as I suppose,” said Radulfus drily,
“but one. One, who brought in here a knife or dagger sharp enough to slice
through these tough cords cleanly. What other intents he brought in with him, I
bid him consider and tremble for his soul. Robert, this ring must be found. All
men of goodwill here will offer their aid, and show freely what they have. So
will every guest who has not theft and sacrilege to hide. And see to it also
that enquiry be made, whether other articles of value have not been missed. For
one theft means one thief, here within.” “It shall be seen to, Father,” said Robert
fervently. “No honest, devout pilgrim will grudge to offer his aid. How could
he wish to share his lodging here with a thief?” There was a stir of agreement and support,
perhaps slightly delayed, as every man and woman eyed a neighbour, and then in
haste elected to speak first. They came from every direction, hitherto unknown
to one another, mingling and forming friendships now with the abandon of holiday.
But how did they know who was immaculate and who was suspect, now the world had
probed a merciless finger within the fold? “Father,” pleaded Ciaran, still sweating
and shaking with distress, “here I offer in this scrip all that I brought into
this enclave. Examine it, show that I have indeed been robbed. Here I came
without even shoes to my feet, my all is here in your hands. And my fellow
Matthew will open to you his own scrip as freely, an example to all these
others that they may deliver themselves pure of blame. What we offer, they will
not refuse.” Matthew had withdrawn his hand from
Melangell’s sharply at this word. He shifted the unbleached cloth scrip, very
like Ciaran’s, round upon his hip. Ciaran’s meagre travelling equipment lay
open in the prior’s hands. Robert slid them back into the pouch from which they
had come, and looked where Ciaran’s distressed gaze guided him. “Into your hands, Father, and willingly,”
said Matthew, and stripped the bag from its buckles and held it forth. Robert acknowledged the offering with a
grave bow, and opened and probed it with delicate consideration. Most of what
was there within he did not display, though he handled it. A spare shirt and
linen drawers, crumpled from being carried so, and laundered on the way,
probably more than once. The means of a gentleman’s sparse toilet, razor,
morsel of lye soap, a leather-bound breviary, a lean purse, a folded trophy of
embroidered ribbon. Robert drew forth the only item he felt he must show, a
sheathed dagger, such as any gentleman might carry at his right hip, barely
longer than a man’s hand. “Yes, that is mine,” said Matthew, looking
Abbot Radulfus straightly in the eyes. “It has not slashed through those cords.
Nor has it left my scrip since I entered your enclave, Father Abbot.” Radulfus looked from the dagger to its
owner, and briefly nodded. “I well understand that no young man would set forth
on these highroads today without the means of defending himself. All the more
if he had another to defend, who carried no weapons. As I understand is your
condition, my son. Yet within these walls you should not bear arms.” “What, then, should I have done?” demanded
Matthew, with a stiffening neck, and a note in his voice that just fell short
of defiance. “What you must do now,” said Radulfus
firmly. “Give it into the care of Brother Porter at the gatehouse, as others
have done with their weapons. When you leave here you may reclaim it freely.” There was nothing to be done but bow the
head and give way gracefully, and Matthew managed it decently enough, but not
gladly. “I will do so, Father, and pray your pardon that I did not ask advice
before.” “But, Father,” Ciaran pleaded anxiously,
“my ring… How shall I survive the way if I have not that safe-conduct to show?” “Your ring shall be sought throughout this
enclave, and every man who bears no guilt for its loss,” said the abbot,
raising his voice to carry to the distant fringes of the silent crowd, “will
freely offer his own possessions for inspection. See to it, Robert!” With that he proceeded on his way, and the
crowd, after some moments of stillness as they watched him out of sight,
dispersed in a sudden murmur of excited speculation. Prior Robert took Ciaran
under his wing, and swept away with him towards the guest-hall, to recruit help
from Brother Denis in his enquiries after the bishop’s ring; and Matthew, not
without one hesitant glance at Melangell, turned on his heel and went hastily
after them. A more innocent and co-operative company
than the guests at Shrewsbury abbey that day it would have been impossible to
find. Every man opened his bundle or box almost eagerly, in haste to
demonstrate his immaculate virtue. The quest, conducted as delicately as
possible, went on all the afternoon, but they found no trace of the ring.
Moreover, one or two of the better-off inhabitants of the common dormitory, who
had had no occasion to penetrate to the bottom of their baggage so far, made
grievous discoveries when they were obliged to do so. A yeoman from Lichfield
found his reserve purse lighter by half than when he had tucked it away. Master
Simeon Poer, one of the first to fling open his possessions, and the loudest in
condemning so blasphemous a crime, claimed to have been robbed of a silver
chain he had intended to present at the altar next day. A poor parish priest,
making this pilgrimage the one fulfilled dream of his life, was left lamenting
the loss of a small casket, made by his own hands over more than a year, and
decorated with inlays of silver and glass, in which he had hoped to carry back
with him some memento of his visit, a dried flower from the garden, even a
thread or two drawn from the fringe of the altar-cloth under Saint Winifred’s
reliquary. A merchant from Worcester could not find his good leather belt to
his best coat, saved up for the morrow. One or two others had a suspicion that
their belongings had been fingered and scorned, which was worst of all. It was all over, and fruitless, when
Cadfael at last repaired to his workshop in time to await the coming of Rhun.
The boy came prompt to his hour, great-eyed and thoughtful, and lay submissive
and mute under Cadfael’s ministrations, which probed every day a little deeper
into his knotted and stubborn tissues. “Brother,” he said at length, looking up,
“you did not find a dagger in any other man’s pouch, did you?” “No, no such thing.” Though there had
been, understandably, a number of small, homely knives, the kind a man needs to
hack his bread and meat in lodgings along the way, or meals under a hedge. Many
of them were sharp enough for most everyday purposes, but not sharp enough to
leave stout cords sheared through without a twitch to betray the assault. “But
men who go shaven carry razors, too, and a blunt razor would be an abomination.
Once a thief comes into the pale, child, it’s hard for honest men to be a match
for him. He who has no scruple has always the advantage of those who keep to
rule. But you need not trouble your heart, you’ve done no wrong to any man.
Never let this ill thing spoil tomorrow for you.” “No,” agreed the boy, still preoccupied.
“But, brother, there is another dagger—one, at least. Sheath and all, a good
length—I know, I was pressed close against him yesterday at Mass. You know I
have to hold fast by my crutches to stand for long, and he had a big linen
scrip on his belt, hard against my hand and arm, where we were crowded
together. I felt the shape of it, cross-hilt and all. I know! But you did not
find it.” “And who was it,” asked Cadfael, still
carefully working the tissues that resisted his fingers, “who had this armoury
about him at Mass?” “It was that big merchant with the good
gown-made from valley wool. I’ve learned to know cloth. They call him Simeon
Poer. But you didn’t find it. Perhaps he’s handed it to Brother Porter, just as
Matthew has had to do now.” “Perhaps,” said Cadfael. “When was it you
discovered this? Yesterday? And what of today? Was he again close to you?” “No, not today.” No, today he had stood stolidly to watch
the play, eyes and ears alert, ready to open his pouch there before all if need
be, smiling complacently as the abbot directed the disarming of another man. He
had certainly had no dagger on him then, however he had disposed of it in the
meantime. There were hiding-places enough here within the walls, for a dagger
and any amount of small, stolen valuables. To search was itself only a
pretence, unless authority was prepared to keep the gates closed and the guests
prisoned within until every yard of the gardens had been dug up, and every bed
and bench in dortoir and hall pulled to pieces. The sinners have always the
start of the honest men. “It was not fair that Matthew should be
made to surrender his dagger,” said Rhun, “when another man had one still about
him. And Ciaran already so terribly afraid to stir, not having his ring. He
won’t even come out of the dortoir until tomorrow. He is sick for loss of it.” Yes, that seemed to be true. And how
strange, thought Cadfael, pricked into realisation, to see a man sweating for
fear, who has already calmly declared himself as one condemned to death? Then
why fear? Fear should be dead. Yet men are strange, he thought in
revulsion. And a blessed and quiet death in Aberdaron, well-prepared, and
surrounded by the prayers and compassion of like-minded votaries, may well seem
a very different matter from crude slaughter by strangers and footpads
somewhere in the wilder stretches of the road. But this Simeon Poer—say he had such a
dagger yesterday, and therefore may well have had it on him today, in the
crowded array of the Mass. Then what did he do with it so quickly, before
Ciaran discovered his loss? And how did he know he must perforce dispose of it
quickly? Who had such fair warning of the need, if not the thief? “Trouble your head no more,” said Cadfael,
looking down at the boy’s beautiful, vulnerable face, “for Matthew nor for
Ciaran, but think only of the morrow, when you approach the saint. Both she and
God see you all, and have no need to be told of what your needs are. All you
have to do is wait in quiet for whatever will be. For whatever it may be, it
will not be wanton. Did you take your dose last night?” Rhun’s pale, brilliant eyes were startled
wide open, sunlight and ice, blindingly clear. “No. It was a good day, I wanted
to give thanks. It isn’t that I don’t value what you can do for me. Only I
wished also to give something. And I did sleep, truly I slept well…” “So do tonight also,” said Cadfael gently,
and slid an arm round the boy’s body to hoist him steadily upright. “Say your
prayers, think quietly what you should do, do it, and sleep. There is no man
living, neither king nor emperor, can do more or better, or trust in a better
harvest.” Ciaran did not stir from within the
guest-hall again that day. Matthew did, against all precedent emerging from the
arched doorway without his companion, and standing at the head of the stone
staircase to the great court with hands spread to touch the courses of the deep
doorway, and head drawn back to heave in great breaths of evening air. Supper
was eaten, the milder evening stir of movement threaded the court, in the cool,
grateful lull before Compline. Brother Cadfael had left the chapter-house
before the end of the readings, having a few things to attend to in the
herbarium, and was crossing towards the garden when he caught sight of the
young man standing there at the top of the steps, breathing in deeply and with
evident pleasure. For some reason Matthew looked taller for being alone, and
younger, his face closed but tranquil in the soft evening light. When he moved
forward and began to descend to the court, Cadfael looked instinctively for the
other figure that should have been close behind him, if not in its usual place
a step before him, but no Ciaran emerged. Well, he had been urged to rest, and
presumably was glad to comply, but never before had Matthew left his side, by
night or day, resting or stirring. Not even to follow Melangell, except
broodingly with his eyes and against his will. People, thought Cadfael, going on his way
without haste, people are endlessly mysterious, and I am endlessly curious. A
sin to be confessed, no doubt, and well worth a penance. As long as man is
curious about his fellowman, that appetite alone will keep him alive. Why do
folk do the things they do? Why, if you know you are diseased and dying, and
wish to reach a desired haven before the end, why do you condemn yourself to do
the long journey barefoot, and burden yourself with a weight about your neck?
How are you thus rendered more acceptable to God, when you might have lent a
hand to someone on the road crippled not by perversity but from birth, like the
boy Rhun? And why do you dedicate your youth and strength to following another
man step by step the length of the land, and why does he suffer you to be his
shadow, when he should be composing his mind to peace, and taking a decent
leave of his friends, not laying his own load upon them? There he checked, rounding the corner of
the yew hedge into the rose garden. It was not his fellow-man he beheld,
sitting in the turf on the far side of the flower beds, gazing across the slope
of the pease fields beyond and the low, stony, silvery summer waters of the
Meole brook, but his fellow-woman, solitary and still, her knees drawn up under
her chin and encircled closely by her folded arms. Aunt Alice Weaver, no doubt,
was deep in talk with half a dozen worthy matrons of her own generation, and
Rhun, surely, already in his bed. Melangell had stolen away alone to be quiet
here in the garden and nurse her lame dreams and indomitable hopes. She was a
small, dark shape, gold-haloed against the bright west. By the look of that
sky, tomorrow, Saint Winifred’s day, would again be cloudless and beautiful. The whole width of the rose garden was
between them, and she did not hear him come and pass by on the grassy path to
his final duties of the day in his workshop, seeing everything put away tidily,
checking the stoppers of all his flagons and flasks, and making sure the
brazier, which had been in service earlier, was safely quenched and cooled.
Brother Oswin, young, enthusiastic and devoted, was nonetheless liable to
overlook details, though he had now outlived his tendency to break things.
Cadfael ran an eye over everything, and found it good. There was no hurry now,
he had time before Compline to sit down here in the wood-scented dimness and
think. Time for others to lose and find one another, and use or waste these
closing moments of the day. For those three blameless tradesmen, Walter Bagot,
glover; John Shure, tailor; William Hales, farrier; to betake themselves to
wherever their dice school was to meet this night, and run their necks into
Hugh’s trap. Time for that more ambiguous character, Simeon Poer, to evade or
trip into the same snare, or go the other way about some other nocturnal
business of his own. Cadfael had seen two of the former three go out from the
gatehouse, and the third follow some minutes later, and was sure in his own
mind that the self-styled merchant of Guildford would not be long after them.
Time, too, for that unaccountably solitary young man, somehow loosed off his
chain, to range this whole territory suddenly opened to him, and happen upon
the solitary girl. Cadfael put up his feet on the wooden
bench, and closed his eyes for a brief respite. Matthew was there at her back before she
knew it. The sudden rustle as he stepped into sun-dried long grass at the edge
of the field startled her, and she swung round in alarm, scrambling to her
knees and staring up into his face with dilated eyes, half-blinded by the blaze
of the sunset into which she had been steadily staring. Her face was utterly
open, vulnerable and childlike. She looked as she had looked when he had swept
her up in his arms and leaped the ditch with her, clear of the galloping
horses. Just so she had opened her eyes and looked up at him, still dazed and
frightened, and just so had her fear melted away into wonder and pleasure,
finding in him nothing but reassurance, kindness and admiration. That pure, paired encounter of eyes did
not last long. She blinked, and shook her head a little to clear her dazzled
vision, and looked beyond him, searching, not believing he could be here alone. “Ciaran…? Is there something you need for
him?” “No,” said Matthew shortly, and for a
moment turned his head away. “He’s in his bed.” “But you never leave his bed!” It was said
in innocence, even in anxiety. Whatever she grudged to Ciaran, she still pitied
and understood him. “You see I have left it,” said Matthew
harshly. “I have needs, too… a breath of air. And he is very well where he is,
and won’t stir.” “I was well sure,” she said with resigned
bitterness, “that you had not come out to look for me.” She made to rise,
swiftly and gracefully enough, but he put out a hand, almost against his will,
as it seemed, to take her under the wrist and lift her. It was withdrawn as
abruptly when she evaded his touch, and rose to her feet unaided. “But at
least,” she said deliberately, “you did not turn and run from me when you found
me. I should be grateful even for that.” “I am not free,” he protested, stung. “You
know it better than any.” “Then neither were you free when we kept
pace along the road,” said Melangell fiercely, “when you carried my burden, and
walked beside me, and let Ciaran hobble along before, where he could not see
how you smiled on me then and were gallant and cherished me when the road was
rough and spoke softly, as if you took delight in being beside me. Why did you
not give me warning then that you were not free? Or better, take him some other
way, and leave us alone? Then I might have taken good heed in time, and in time
forgotten you. As now I never shall! Never, to my life’s end!” All the flesh of his lips and cheeks
shrank and tightened before her eyes, in a contortion of either rage or pain,
she could not tell which. She was staring too close and too passionately to see
very clearly. He turned his head sharply away, to evade her eyes. “You charge me justly,” he said in a harsh
whisper, “I was at fault. I never should have believed there could be so clean
and sweet a happiness for me. I should have left you, but I could not… Oh, God!
You think I could have turned him? He clung to you, to your good aunt… Yet I
should have been strong enough to hold off from you and let you alone…” As
rapidly as he had swung away from her he swung back again, reaching a hand to
take her by the chin and hold her face to face with him, so ungently that she
felt the pressure of his fingers bruising her flesh. “Do you know how hard a
thing you are asking? No! This countenance you never saw, did you, never but through
someone else’s eyes. Who would provide you a mirror to see yourself? Some pool,
perhaps, if ever you had the leisure to lean over and look. How should you know
what this face can do to a man already lost? And you marvel I took what I could
get for water in a drought, when it walked beside me? I should rather have died
than stay beside you, to trouble your peace. God forgive me!” She was five years nearer childhood than
he, even taking into account the two years or more a girl child has advantage
over the boys of her own age. She stood entranced, a little frightened by his
intensity, and inexpressibly moved by the anguish she felt emanating from him
like a raw, drowning odour. The long-fingered hand that held her shook
terribly, his whole body quivered. She put up her own hand gently and closed it
over his, uplifted out of her own wretchedness by his greater and more
inexplicable distress. “I dare not speak for God,” she said
steadily, “but whatever there may be for me to forgive, that I dare. It is not
your fault that I love you. All you ever did was be kinder to me than ever man
was since I left Wales. And I did know, love, you did tell me, if I had heeded
then, you did tell me you were a man under vow. What it was you never told me,
but never grieve, oh, my own soul, never grieve so…” While they stood rapt, the sunset light
had deepened, blazed and burned silently into glowing ash, and the first
feathery shade of twilight, like the passing of a swift’s wings, fled across
their faces and melted into sudden pearly, radiant light. Her wide eyes were
brimming with tears, almost the match of his. When he stooped to her, there was
no way of knowing which of them had begun the kiss. The little bell for Compline sounded
clearly through the gardens on so limpid an evening, and stirred Brother
Cadfael out of his half-doze at once. He was accustomed, in this refuge of his
maturity as surely as in the warfaring of his youth, to awake fresh and alert,
as he fell asleep, making the most of the twin worlds of night and day. He rose
and went out into the earliest glowing image of evening, and closed the door
after him. It was but a few moments back to church
through the herbarium and the rose garden. He went briskly, happy with the
beauty of the evening and the promise for the morrow, and never knew why he
should look aside to westward in passing, unless it was that the whole expanse
of the sky on that side was delicate, pure and warming, like a girl’s blush.
And there they were, two clear shadows clasped together in silhouette against
the fire of the west, outlined on the crest above the slope to the invisible
brook. Matthew and Melangell, unmistakable, constrained still but in each
other’s arms, linked in a kiss that lasted while Brother Cadfael came, passed
and slipped away to his different devotions, but with that image printed
indelibly on his eyes, even in his prayers. Chapter Seven THE OUTRIDER of the bishop-legate’s
envoy—or should he rather be considered the empress’s envoy?—arrived within the
town and was directed through to the gatehouse of the castle in mid-evening of
that same twenty-first day of June, to be presented to Hugh Beringar just as he
was marshalling a half-dozen men to go down to the bridge and take an
unpredicted part in the plans of Master Simeon Poer and his associates. Who
would almost certainly be armed, being so far from home and in hitherto
unexplored territory. Hugh found the visitor an unwelcome hindrance, but was
too well aware of the many perils hemming the king’s party on every side to dismiss
the herald without ceremony. Whatever this embassage might be, he needed to
know it, and make due preparation to deal with it. In the gatehouse guard-room
he found himself facing a stolid middle-aged squire, who delivered his errand
word perfect. “My lord sheriff, the Lady of the English
and the lord bishop of Winchester entreat you to receive in peace their envoy,
who comes to you with offerings of peace and good order in their name, and in
their name asks your aid in resolving the griefs of the kingdom. I come before
to announce him.” So the empress had assumed the traditional
title of a queen-elect before her coronation! The matter began to look final. “The lord bishop’s envoy will be welcome,”
said Hugh, “and shall be received with all honour here in Shrewsbury. I will
lend an attentive ear to whatever he may have to say to me. As at this moment I
have an affair in hand which will not wait. How far ahead of your lord do you
ride?” “A matter of two hours, perhaps,” said the
squire, considering. “Good, then I can set forward all
necessary preparations for his reception, and still have time to clear up a
small thing I have in hand. With how many attendants does he come?” “Two men-at-arms only, my lord, and
myself.” “Then I will leave you in the hands of my
deputy, who will have lodgings made ready for you and your two men here in the
castle. As for your lord, he shall come to my own house, and my wife shall make
him welcome. Hold me excused if I make small ceremony now, for this business is
a twilight matter, and will not wait. Later I will see amends made.” The messenger was well content to have his
horse stabled and tended, and be led away by Alan Herbard to a comfortable
lodging where he could shed his boots and leather coat, and be at his ease, and
take his time and his pleasure over the meat and wine that was presently set
before him. Hugh’s young deputy would play the host very graciously. He was
still new in office, and did everything committed to him with a flourish. Hugh
left them to it, and took his half-dozen men briskly out through the town. It was past Compline then, neither light
nor dark, but hesitant between. By the time they reached the High Cross and
turned down the steep curve of the Wyle they had their twilight eyes. In full
darkness their quarry might have a better chance of eluding them, by daylight
they would themselves have been too easily observed from afar. If these
gamesters were experts they would have a lookout posted to give fair warning. The Wyle, uncoiling eastward, brought them
down to the town wall and the English gate, and there a thin, leggy child,
shaggy-haired and bright-eyed, started out of the shadows under the gate to
catch at Hugh’s sleeve. Wat’s boy, a sharp urchin of the Foregate, bursting
with the importance of his errand and his own wit in managing it, had pinned
down his quarry, and waited to inform and advise. “My lord, they’re met—all the four from
the abbey, and a dozen or more from these parts, mostly from the town.” His
note of scorn implied that they were sharper in the Foregate. “You’d best leave
the horses and go afoot. Riders out at this hour—they’d break and run as soon
as you set hooves on the bridge. The sound carries.” Good sense, that, if the meeting-place was
close by. “Where are they, then?” asked Hugh, dismounting. “Under the far arch of the bridge, my
lord—dry as a bone it is, and snug.” So it would be, with this low summer
water. Only in full spate did the river prevent passage beneath that arch. In
this fine season it would be a nest of dried-out grasses. “They have a light, then?” “A dark lantern. There’s not a glimmer
you’ll see from either side unless you go down to the water, it sheds light
only on the flat stone where they’re throwing.” Easily quenched, then, at the first alarm,
and they would scatter like startled birds, every way. The fleecers would be
the first and fleetest. The fleeced might well be netted in some numbers, but
their offence was no more than being foolish at their own expense, not theft
nor malpractice on any other. “We leave the horses here,” said Hugh,
making up his mind. “You heard the boy. They’re under the bridge, they’ll have
used the path that goes down to the Gaye, along the riverside. The other side
of the arch is thick bushes, but that’s the way they’ll break. Three men to
either slope, and I’ll bear with the western three. And let our own young fools
by, if you can pick them out, but hold fast the strangers.” In this fashion they went to their
raiding. They crossed the bridge by ones and twos, above the Severn water green
with weedy shallows and shimmering with reflected light, and took their places
on either side, spaced among the fringing bushes of the bank. By the time they
were in place the afterglow had dissolved and faded into the western horizon,
and the night came down like a velvet hand. Hugh drew off to westward along the
by-road until at length he caught the faint glimmer of light beneath the stone
arch. They were there. If in such numbers, perhaps he should have held them in
better respect and brought more men. But he did not want the townsmen. By all
means let them sneak away to their beds and think better of their dreams of
milking cows likely to prove drier than sand. It was the cheats he wanted. Let
the provost of the town deal with his civic idiots. He let the sky darken somewhat before he
took them in. The summer night settled, soft wings folding, and no moon. Then,
at his whistle, they moved down from either flank. It was the close-set bushes on the bank,
rustling stealthily in a windless night, that betrayed their coming a moment
too soon. Whoever was on watch, below there, had a sharp ear. There was a
shrill whistle, suddenly muted. The lantern went out instantly, there was black
dark under the solid stonework of the bridge. Down went Hugh and his men,
abandoning stealth for speed. Bodies parted, collided, heaved and fled, with no
sound but the panting and gasping of scared breath. Hugh’s officers waded
through bushes, closing down to seal the archway. Some of those thus penned
beneath the bridge broke to left, some to right, not venturing to climb into
waiting arms, but wading through the shallows and floundering even into deeper
water. A few struck out for the opposite shore, local lads well acquainted with
their river and its reaches, and water-borne, like its fish, almost from birth.
Let them go, they were Shrewsbury born and bred. If they had lost money, more
fools they, but let them get to their beds and repent in peace. If their wives
would let them! But there were those beneath the arch of
the bridge who had not Severn water in their blood, and were less ready to wet
more than their feet in even low water. And suddenly these had steel in their
hands, and were weaving and slashing and stabbing their way through into the
open as best they could, and without scruple. It did not last long. In the
quaking dark, sprawled among the trampled grasses up the riverside, Hugh’s six
clung to such captives as they could grapple, and shook off trickles of blood
from their own scratches and gashes. And diminishing in the darkness, the
thresh and toss of bushes marked the flight of those who had got away. Unseen
beneath the bridge, the deserted lantern and scattered dice, grave loss to a
trickster who must now prepare a new set, lay waiting to be retrieved. Hugh shook off a few drops of blood from a
grazed arm, and went scrambling through the rough grass to the path leading up
from the Gaye to the highroad and the bridge. Before him a shadowy body fled,
cursing. Hugh launched a shout to reach the road ahead of them: “Hold him! The
law wants him!” Foregate and town might be on their way to bed, but there were
always late strays, both lawful and unlawful, and some on both sides would
joyfully take up such an invitation to mischief or justice, whichever way the
mind happened to bend. Above him, in the deep, soft summer night
that now bore only a saffron thread along the west, an answering hail shrilled,
startled and merry, and there were confused sounds of brief, breathless
struggle. Hugh loped up to the highroad to see three shadowy horsemen halted at
the approach to the bridge, two of them closed in to flank the first, and that
first leaning slightly from his saddle to grip in one hand the collar of a
panting figure that leaned against his mount heaving in breath, and with small
energy to attempt anything besides. “I think, sir,” said the captor, eyeing
Hugh’s approach, “this may be what you wanted. It seemed to me that the law
cried out for him? Am I then addressing the law in these parts?” It was a fine, ringing voice, unaccustomed
to subduing its tone. The soft dark did not disclose his face clearly, but
showed a body erect in the saddle, supple, shapely, unquestionably young. He
shifted his grip on the prisoner, as though to surrender him to a better claim.
Thus all but released, the fugitive did not break free and run for it, but
spread his feet and stood his ground, half-defiant, eyeing Hugh dubiously. “I’m in your debt for a minnow, it seems,”
said Hugh, grinning as he recognised the man he had been chasing. “But I doubt
I’ve let all the salmon get clear away up-river. We were about breaking up a
parcel of cheating rogues come here looking for prey, but this young gentleman
you have by the coat turns out to be merely one of the simpletons, our worthy
goldsmith out of the town. Master Daniel, I doubt there’s more gold and silver
to be lost than gained, in the company you’ve been keeping.” “It’s no crime to make a match at dice,”
muttered the young man, shuffling his feet sullenly in the dust of the road.
“My luck would have turned…” “Not with the dice they brought with them.
But true it’s no crime to waste your evening and go home with empty pockets,
and I’ve no charge to make against you, provided you go back now, and hand
yourself over with the rest to my sergeant. Behave yourself prettily, and
you’ll be home by midnight.” Master Daniel Aurifaber took his dismissal
thankfully, and slouched back towards the bridge, to be gathered in among the
captives. The sound of hooves crossing the bridge at a trot indicated that someone
had run for the horses, and intended a hunt to westward, in the direction the
birds of prey had taken. In less than a mile they would be safe in woodland,
and it would take hounds to run them to earth. Small chance of hunting them
down by night. On the morrow something might be attempted. “This is hardly the welcome I intended for
you,” said Hugh, peering up into the shadowy face above him. “For you, I think,
must be the envoy sent from the Empress Maud and the bishop of Winchester. Your
herald arrived little more than an hour ago, I did not expect you quite so
soon. I had thought I should be done with this matter by the time you came. My
name is Hugh Beringar, I stand here as sheriff for King Stephen. Your men are
provided for at the castle, I’ll send a guide with them. You, sir, are my own
guest, if you will do my house that honour.” “You’re very gracious,” said the empress’s
messenger blithely, “and with all my heart I will. But had you not better first
make up your accounts with these townsmen of yours, and let them creep away to
their beds? My business can well wait a little longer.” “Not the most successful action ever I
planned,” Hugh owned later to Cadfael. “I under-estimated both their hardihood
and the amount of cold steel they’d have about them.” There were four guests missing from
Brother Denis’s halls that night: Master Simeon Poer, merchant of Guildford;
Walter Bagot, glover; John Shure, tailor; William Hales, farrier. Of these,
William Hales lay that night in a stone cell in Shrewsbury castle, along with a
travelling pedlar who had touted for them in the town, but the other three had
all broken safely away, bar a few scratches and bruises, into the woods to
westward, the most northerly outlying spinneys of the Long Forest, there to bed
down in the warm night and count their injuries and their gains, which were
considerable. They could not now return to the abbey or the town; the traffic
would in any case have stood only one more night at a profit. Three nights are
the most to be reckoned on, after that some aggrieved wretch is sure to grow
suspicious. Nor could they yet venture south again. But the man who lives on
his wits must keep them well honed and adaptable, and there are more ways than
one of making a dishonest living. As for the young rufflers and simple
tradesmen who had come out with visions of rattling their winnings on the way
home to their wives, they were herded into the gatehouse to be chided, warned,
and sent home chapfallen, with very little in their pockets. And there the night’s work would have
ended, if the flare of the torch under the gateway had not caught the metal
gleam of a ring on Daniel Aurifaber’s right hand, flat silver with an oval
bezel, for one instant sharply defined. Hugh saw it, and laid a hand on the
goldsmith’s arm to detain him. “That ring-let me see it closer!” Daniel handed it over with a hint of
reluctance, though it seemed to stem rather from bewilderment than from any
feeling of guilt. It fitted closely, and passed over his knuckle with slight
difficulty, but the finger bore no sign of having worn it regularly. “Where did you get this?” asked Hugh,
holding it under the flickering light to examine the device and inscription. “I bought it honestly,” said Daniel
defensively. “That I need not doubt. But from whom?
From one of those gamesters? Which one?” “The merchant—Simeon Poer he called
himself. He offered it, and it was a good piece of work. I paid well for it.” “You have paid double for it, my friend,”
said Hugh, “for you bid fair to lose ring and money and all. Did it never enter
your mind that it might be stolen?” By the single nervous flutter of the
goldsmith’s eyelids the thought had certainly occurred to him, however
hurriedly he had put it out of his mind again. “No! Why should I think so? He
seemed a stout, prosperous person, all he claimed to be…” “This very morning,” said Hugh, “just such
a ring was taken during Mass from a pilgrim at the abbey. Abbot Radulfus sent
word up to the provost, after they had searched thoroughly within the pale, in
case it should be offered for sale in the market. I had the description of it
in turn from the provost. This is the device and inscription of the bishop of
Winchester, and it was given to the bearer to secure him safe-conduct on the
road.” “But I bought it in good faith,” protested
Daniel, dismayed. “I paid the man what he asked, the ring is mine, honestly
come by.” “From a thief. Your misfortune, lad, and
it may teach you to be more wary of sudden kind acquaintances in the future who
offer you rings to buy—wasn’t it so?—at somewhat less than you know to be their
value? Travelling men rattling dice give nothing for nothing, but take whatever
they can get. If they’ve emptied your purse for you, take warning for the next
time. This must go back to the lord abbot in the morning. Let him deal with the
owner.” He saw the goldsmith draw angry breath to complain of his deprivation,
and shook his head to ward off the effort, not unkindly. “You have no remedy.
Bite your tongue, Daniel, and go make your peace with your wife.” The empress’s envoy rode gently up the
Wyle in the deepening dark, keeping pace with Hugh’s smaller mount. His own was
a fine, tall beast, and the young man in the saddle was long of body and limb.
Afoot, thought Hugh, studying him sidelong, he will top me by a head. Very much
of an age with me, I might give him a year or two, hardly more. “Were you ever in Shrewbury before?” “Never. Once, perhaps, I was just within
the shire, I am not sure how the border runs. I was near Ludlow once. This
abbey of yours, I marked it as I came by, a very fine, large enclosure. They
keep the Benedictine Rule?” “They do.” Hugh expected further
questions, but they did not come. “You have kinsmen in the Order?” Even in the dark he was aware of his
companion’s grave, musing smile. “In a manner of speaking, yes, I have. I think
he would give me leave to call him so, though there is no blood-kinship. One
who used me like a son. I keep a kindness for the habit, for his sake. And did
I hear you say there are pilgrims here now? For some particular feast?” “For the translation of Saint Winifred,
who was brought here four years ago from Wales. Tomorrow is the day of her
arrival.” Hugh had spoken by custom, quite forgetting what Cadfael had told him
of that arrival, but the mention of it brought his friend’s story back sharply
to mind. “I was not in Shrewsbury then,” he said, withholding judgement. “I
brought my manors to King Stephen’s support the following year. My own country
is the north of the shire.” They had reached the top of the hill, and
were turning towards Saint Mary’s church. The great gate of Hugh’s courtyard
stood wide, with torches at the gateposts, waiting for them. His message had
been faithfully delivered to Aline, and she was waiting for them with all due
ceremony, the bedchamber prepared, the meal ready to come to table. All rules,
all times, bow to the coming of a guest, the duty and privilege of hospitality. She met them at the door, opening it wide
to welcome them in. They stepped into the hall, and into a flood of light from
torches at the walls and candles on the table, and instinctively they turned to
face each other, taking the first long look. It grew ever longer as their
intent eyes grew wider. It was a question which of them groped towards
recognition first. Memory pricked and realisation awoke almost stealthily.
Aline stood smiling and wondering, but mute, eyeing first one, then the other,
until they should stir and shed a clearer light. “But I know you!” said Hugh. “Now I see
you, I do know you.” “I have seen you before,” agreed the
guest. “I was never in this shire but the once, and yet…” “It needed light to see you by,” said
Hugh, “for I never heard your voice but the once, and then no more than a few
words. I doubt if you even remember them, but I do. Six words only. “Now have
ado with a man!” you said. And your name, your name I never heard but in a
manner I take as it was meant. You are Robert, the forester’s son who fetched
Yves Hugonin out of that robber fortress up on Titterstone Clee. And took him
home with you, I think, and his sister with him.” “And you are that officer who laid the
siege that gave me the cover I needed,” cried the guest, gleaming. “Forgive me
that I hid from you then, but I had no warranty there in your territory. How
glad I am to meet you honestly now, with no need to take to flight.” “And no need now to be Robert, the
forester’s son,” said Hugh, elated and smiling. “My name I have given you, and
the freedom of this house I offer with it. Now may I know yours?” “In Antioch, where I was born,” said the
guest, “I was called Daoud. But my father was an Englishman of Robert of
Normandy’s force, and among his comrades in arms I was baptised a Christian,
and took the name of the priest who stood my godfather. Now I bear the name of
Olivier de Bretagne.” They sat late into the night together,
savouring each other now face to face, after a year and a half of remembering
and wondering. But first, as was due, they made short work of Olivier’s errand
here. “I am sent,” he said seriously, “to urge
all sheriffs of shires to consider, whatever their previous fealty, whether
they should not now accept the proffered peace under the Empress Maud, and take
the oath of loyalty to her. This is the message of the bishop and the council:
This land has all too long been torn between two factions, and suffered great
damage and loss through their mutual enmity. And here, say that I lay no blame
on that party which is not my own, for there are valid claims on both sides,
and equally the blame falls on both for failing to come to some agreement to
end these distresses. The fortune at Lincoln might just as well have fallen the
opposing way, but it fell as it did, and England is left with a king made
captive, and a queen-elect free and in the ascendant. Is it not time to call a
halt? For the sake of order and peace and the sound regulation of the realm,
and to have a government in command which can and must put down the many
injustices and tyrannies which you know, as well as I, have set themselves up
outside all law. Surely any strong rule is better than no rule at all. For the
sake of peace and order, will you not accept the empress, and hold your county
in allegiance to her? She is already in Westminster now, the preparations for
her coronation go forward. There is a far better prospect of success if all
sheriffs come in to strengthen her rule.” “You are asking me,” said Hugh gently, “to
go back on my sworn fealty to King Stephen.” “Yes,” agreed Olivier honestly, “I am. For
weighty reasons, and in no treasonous mind. You need not love, only forbear
from hating. Think of it rather as keeping your fealty to the people of this
county of yours, and this land.” “That I can do as well or better on the
side where I began,” said Hugh, smiling. “It is what I am doing now, as best I
can. It is what I will continue to do while I have breath. I am King Stephen’s
man, and I will not desert him.” “Ah, well!” said Olivier, smiling and
sighing in the same breath. “To tell you truth, now I’ve met you, I expected
nothing less. I would not go from my oath, either. My lord is the empress’s
man, and I am my lord’s man, and if our positions were changed round, my answer
would be the same as yours. Yet there is truth in what I have pleaded. How much
can a people bear? Your labourer in the fields, your little townsman with a
bare living to be looted from him, these would be glad to settle for Stephen or
for Maud, only to be rid of the other. And I do what I am sent out to do, as
well as I can.” “I have no fault to find with the matter
or the manner,” said Hugh. “Where next do you go? Though I hope you will not go
for a day or two, I would know you better, and we have a great deal to talk
over, you and I.” “From here north-east to Stafford, Derby,
Nottingham, and back by the eastern parts. Some will come to terms, as some
lords have done already. Some will hold to their own king, like you. And some
will do as they have done before, go back and forth like a weather-cock with
the wind, and put up their price at every change. No matter, we have done with
that now.” He leaned forward over the table, setting
his wine-cup aside. “I had—I have—another errand of my own, and I should be
glad to stay with you a few days, until I have found what I’m seeking, or made
certain it is not here to be found. Your mention of this flood of pilgrims for
the feast gives me a morsel of hope. A man who wills to be lost could find
cover among so many, all strangers to one another. I am looking for a young man
called Luc Meverel. He has not, to your knowledge, made his way here?” “Not by that name,” said Hugh, interested
and curious. “But a man who willed to be lost might choose to doff his own
name. What’s your need of him?” “Not mine. It’s a lady who wants him back.
You may not have got word, this far north,” said Oliver, “of everything that
happened in Winchester during the council. There was a death there that came
all too near to me. Did you hear of it? King Stephen’s queen sent her clerk
there with a bold challenge to the legate’s authority, and the man was attacked
for his audacity in the street by night, and got off with his life only at the
cost of another life.” “We have indeed heard of it,” said Hugh
with kindling interest. “Abbot Radulfus was there at the council, and brought
back a full report. A knight by the name of Rainald Bossard, who came to the
clerk’s aid when he was set upon. One of those in the service of Laurence
d’Angers, so we heard.” “Who is my lord, also.” “By your good service to his kin at
Bromfield that was plain enough. I thought of you when the abbot spoke of
d’Angers, though I had no name for you then. Then this man Bossard was well
known to you?” “Through a year of service in Palestine,
and the voyage home together. A good man he was, and a good friend to me, and
struck down in defending his honest opponent. I was not with him that night, I
wish I had been, he might yet be alive. But he had only one or two of his own
people, not in arms. There were five or six set on the clerk, it was a wretched
business, confused and in the dark. The murderer got clean away, and has never
been traced. Rainald’s wife… Juliana… I did not know her until we came with our
lord to Winchester, Rainald’s chief manor is nearby. I have learned,” said
Olivier very gravely, “to hold her in the highest regard. She was her lord’s
true match, and no one could say more or better of any lady.” “There is an heir?” asked Hugh. “A man
grown, or still a child?” “No, they never had children. Rainald was
nearly fifty, she cannot be many years younger. And very beautiful,” said
Olivier with solemn consideration, as one attempting not to praise, but to
explain. “Now she’s widowed she’ll have a hard fight on her hands to evade
being married off again—for she’ll want no other after Rainald. She has manors
of her own to bestow. They had thought of the inheritance, the two of them
together, that’s why they took into their household this young man Luc Meverel,
only a year ago. He is a distant cousin of Dame Juliana, twenty-four or
twenty-five years old, I suppose, and landless. They meant to make him their
heir.” He fell silent for some minutes, frowning
past the guttering candles, his chin in his palm. Hugh studied him, and waited.
It was a face worth studying, clean-boned, olive-skinned, fiercely beautiful,
even with the golden, falcon’s eyes thus hooded. The blue-black hair that
clustered thickly about his head, clasping like folded wings, shot sullen
bluish lights back from the candle’s waverings. Daoud, born in Antioch, son of
an English crusading soldier in Robert of Normandy’s following, somehow blown
across the world in the service of an Angevin baron, to fetch up here almost
more Norman than the Normans… The world, thought Hugh, is not so great, after
all, but a man born to venture may bestride it. “I have been three times in that household,”
said Olivier, “but I never knowingly set eyes on this Luc Meverel. All I know
of him is what others have said, but among the others I take my choice which
voice to believe. There is no one, man or woman, in that manor but agrees he
was utterly devoted to Dame Juliana. But as to the manner of his devotion…
There are many who say he loved her far too well, by no means after the fashion
of a son. Again, some say he was equally loyal to Rainald, but their voices are
growing fainter now. Luc was one of those with his lord when Rainald was
stabbed to death in the street. And two days later he vanished from his place,
and has not been seen since.” “Now I begin to see,” said Hugh, drawing
in cautious breath. “Have they gone so far as to say this man slew his lord in
order to gain his lady?” “It is being said now, since his flight.
Who began the whisper there’s no telling, but by this time it’s grown into a
bellow.” “Then why should he run from the prize for
which he had played? It makes poor sense. If he had stayed there need have been
no such whispers.” “Ah, but I think there would have been,
whether he went or stayed. There were those who grudged him his fortune, and
would have welcomed any means of damaging him. They are finding two good
reasons, now, why he should break and run. The first, pure guilt and remorse,
too late to save any one of the three of them. The second, fear—fear that
someone had got wind of his act, and meant to fetch out the truth at all costs.
Either way, a man might break and take to his heels. What you kill for may seem
even less attainable,” said Olivier with rueful shrewdness, “once you have
killed.” “But you have not yet told me,” said Hugh,
“what the lady says of him. Hers is surely a voice that should be heeded.” “She says that such a vile suspicion is
impossible. She did, she does, value her young cousin, but not in the way of
love, nor will she have it that he has ever entertained such thoughts of her.
She says he would have died for his lord, and that it is his lord’s death which
has driven him away, sick with grief, a little mad—who knows how deluded and
haunted? For he was there that night, he saw Rainald die. She is sure of him.
She wants him found and brought back to her. She looks upon him as a son, and
now more than ever she needs him.” “And it’s for her sake you’re seeking him.
But why look for him here, northwards? He may have gone south, west, across the
sea by the Kentish ports. Why to the north?” “Because we have just one word of him
since he was lost from his place, and that was going north on the road to
Newbury. I came by that same way, by Abingdon and Oxford, and I have enquired
for him everywhere, a young man travelling alone. But I can only seek him by
his own name, for I know no other for him. As you say, who knows what he may be
calling himself now!” “And you don’t even know what he looks
like—nothing but merely his age? You’re hunting for a spectre!” “What is lost can always be found, it
needs only enough patience.” Olivier’s hawk’s face, beaked and passionate, did
not suggest patience, but the set of his lips was stubborn and pure in absolute
resolution. “Well, at least,” said Hugh, considering,
“we may go down to see Saint Winifred brought home to her altar, tomorrow, and
Brother Denis can run through the roster of his pilgrims for us, and point out
any who are of the right age and kind, solitary or not. As for strangers here
in the town, I fancy Provost Corviser should be able to put his finger on most
of them. Every man knows every man in Shrewsbury. But the abbey is the more
likely refuge, if he’s here at all.” He pondered, gnawing a thoughtful lip. “I
must send the ring down to the abbot at first light, and let him know what’s
happened to his truant guests, but before I may go down to the feast myself I
must send out a dozen men and have them beat the near reaches of the woods to
westward for our game birds. If they’re over the border, so much the worse for
Wales, and I can do no more, but I doubt if they intend to live wild any longer
than they need. They may not go far. How if I should leave you with the
provost, to pick his brains for your quarry here within the town, while I go
hunting for mine? Then we’ll go down together to see the brothers bring their
saint home, and talk to Brother Denis concerning the list of his guests.” “That would suit me well,” said Olivier
gladly. “I should like to pay my respects to the lord abbot, I do recall seeing
him in Winchester, though he would not notice me. And there was a brother of
that house, if you recall,” he said, his golden eyes veiled within long black
lashes that swept his fine cheekbones, “who was with you at Bromfield and up on
Clee, that time… You must know him well. He is still here at the abbey?” “He is. He’ll be back in his bed now after
Lauds. And you and I had better be thinking of seeking ours, if we’re to be
busy tomorrow.” “He was good to my lord’s young kinsfolk,”
said Olivier. “I should like to see him again.” No need to ask for a name, thought Hugh,
eyeing him with a musing smile. And indeed, should he know the name? He had not
mentioned any, when he spoke of one who was no blood-kin, but who had used him
like a son, one for whose sake he kept a kindness for the Benedictine habit. “You shall!” said Hugh, and rose in high
content to marshal his guest to the bedchamber prepared for him. Chapter Eight ABBOT RADULFUS WAS UP LONG BEFORE PRIME on
the festal morning, and so were his obedientiaries, all of whom had their
important tasks in preparation for the procession. When Hugh’s messenger
presented himself at the abbot’s lodging the dawn was still fresh, dewy and
cool, the light lying brightly across the roofs while the great court lay in
lilac-tinted shadow. In the gardens every tree and bush cast a long band of
shade, striping the flower beds like giant brush-strokes in some gilded
illumination. The abbot received the ring with
astonished pleasure, relieved of one flaw that might have marred the splendour
of the day. “And you say these malefactors were guests in our halls, all four?
We are well rid of them, but if they are armed, as you say, and have taken to
the woods close by, we shall need to warn our travellers, when they leave us.” “My lord Beringar has a company out
beating the edges of the forest for them this moment,” said the messenger.
“There was nothing to gain by following them in the dark, once they were in
cover. But by daylight we’ll hope to trace them. One we have safe in hold, he
may tell us more about them, where they’re from, and what they have to answer
for elsewhere. But at least now they can’t hinder your festivities.” “And for that I’m devoutly thankful. As
this man Ciaran will certainly be for the recovery of his ring.” He added, with
a glance aside at the breviary that lay on his desk, and a small frown for the
load of ceremonial that lay before him for the next few hours: “Shall we not
see the lord sheriff here for Mass this morning?” “Yes, Father, he does intend it, and he
brings a guest also. He had first to set this hunt in motion, but before Mass
they will be here.” “He has a guest?” “An envoy from the empress’s court came
last night, Father. A man of Laurence d’Angers’ household, Olivier de
Bretagne.” The name that had meant nothing to Hugh
meant as little to Radulfus, though he nodded recollection and understanding at
mention of the young man’s overlord. “Then will you say to Hugh Beringar that I
beg he and his guest will remain after Mass, and dine with me here. I should be
glad to make the acquaintance of Messire de Bretagne, and hear his news.” “I will so tell him, Father,” said the
messenger, and forthwith took his leave. Left alone in his parlour, Abbot Radulfus
stood for a moment looking down thoughtfully at the ring in his palm. The
sheltering hand of the bishop-legate would certainly be a powerful protection
to any traveller so signally favoured, wherever there existed any order or
respect for law, whether in England or Wales. Only those already outside the
pale of law, with lives or liberty already forfeit if taken, would defy so
strong a sanction. After this crowning day many of the guests here would be
leaving again for home. He must not forget to give due warning, before they
dispersed, that malefactors might be lurking at large in the woods to westward,
and that they were armed, and all too handy at using their daggers. Best that
the pilgrims should make sure of leaving in companies stout enough to
discourage assault. Meantime, there was satisfaction in
returning to one pilgrim, at least, his particular armour. The abbot rang the little bell that lay
upon his desk, and in a few moments Brother Vitalis came to answer the summons. “Will you enquire at the guest-hall,
brother, for the man called Ciaran, and bid him here to speak with me?” Brother Cadfael had also risen well before
Prime, and gone to open his workshop and kindle his brazier into cautious and
restrained life, in case it should be needed later to prepare tisanes for some
ecstatic souls carried away by emotional excitement, or warm applications for
weaker vessels trampled in the crowd. He was used to the transports of simple
souls caught up in far from simple raptures. He had a few things to tend to, and was
happy to deal with them alone. Young Oswin was entitled to his fill of sleep
until the bell awoke him. Very soon now he would graduate to the hospital of
Saint Giles, where the reliquary of Saint Winifred now lay, and the
unfortunates who carried their contagion with them, and might not be admitted
into the town, could find rest, care and shelter for as long as they needed it.
Brother Mark, that dearly-missed disciple, was gone from there now, already
ordained deacon, his eyes fixed ahead upon his steady goal of priesthood. If
ever he cast a glance over his shoulder, he would find nothing but
encouragement and affection, the proper harvest of the seed he had sown. Oswin
might not be such another, but he was a good enough lad, and would do honestly
by the unfortunates who drifted into his care. Cadfael went down to the banks of the
Meole brook, the westward boundary of the enclave, where the pease fields
declined to the sunken summer water. The rays from the east were just being
launched like lances over the high roofs of the monastic buildings, and
piercing the scattered copses beyond the brook, and the grassy banks on the
further side. This same water, drawn off much higher in its course, supplied
the monastery fish-ponds, the hatchery, and the mill and millpond beyond, and
was fed back into the brook just before it entered the Severn. It lay low
enough now, an archipelago of shoals, half sand, half grass and weed, spreading
smooth islands across its breadth. After this spell, thought Cadfael, we shall
need plenty of rain. But let that wait a day or two. He turned back to climb the slope again.
The earlier field of pease had already been gleaned, the second would be about
ready for harvesting after the festival. A couple of days, and all the
excitement would be over, and the horarium of the house and the cycle of the
seasons would resume their imperturbable progress, two enduring rhythms in the
desperately variable fortunes of mankind. He turned along the path to his
workshop, and there was Melangell hesitating before its closed door. She heard his step in the gravel behind
her, and looked round with a bright, expectant face. The pearly morning light
became her, softened the coarseness of her linen gown, and smoothed cool lilac
shadows round the childlike curves of her face. She had gone to great pains to
prepare herself fittingly for the day’s solemnities. Her skirts were spotless,
crisped out with care, her dark-gold hair, burning with coppery lustre, braided
and coiled on her head in a bright crown, its tight plaits drawing up the skin
of her temples and cheeks so strongly that her brows were pulled aslant, and
the dark-lashed blue eyes elongated and made mysterious. But the radiance that
shone from her came not from the sun’s caresses, but from within. The blue of
those eyes burned as brilliantly as the blue of the gentians Cadfael had seen
long ago in the mountains of southern France, on his way to the east. The ivory
and rose of her cheeks glowed. Melangell was in the highest state of hope,
happiness and expectation. She made him a very pretty reverence,
flushing and smiling, and held out to him the little vial of poppy-syrup he had
given to Rhun three days ago. Still unopened! “If you please, Brother Cadfael, I have
brought this back to you. And Rhun prays that it may serve some other who needs
it more, and with the more force because he has endured without it.” He took it from her gently and held it in
his cupped hand, a crude little vial stopped with a wooden stopper and a
membrane of very thin parchment tied with a waxed thread to seal it. All
intact. The boy’s third night here, and he had submitted to handling and been
mild and biddable in all, but when the means of oblivion was put into his hand
and left to his private use, he had preserved it, and with it some core of his
own secret integrity, at his own chosen cost. God forbid, thought Cadfael, that
I should meddle there. Nothing short of a saint should knock on that door. “You are not angry with him?” asked
Melangell anxiously, but smiling still, unable to believe that any shadow
should touch the day, now that her love had clasped and kissed her. “Because he
did not drink it? It was not that he ever doubted you. He said so to me. He
said—I never quite understand him!—he said it was a time for offering, and he
had his offering prepared.” Cadfael asked: “Did he sleep?” To have
deliverance in hand, even unopened, might well bring peace. “Hush, now, no, how
could I be angry! But did he sleep?” “He says that he did. I think it must be
true, he looks so fresh and young. I prayed hard for him.” With all the force
of her new happiness, loaded with bliss she felt the need to pour out upon all
those near to her. In the conveyance of blessedness by affection Cadfael firmly
believed. “You prayed well,” said Cadfael. “Never
doubt he has gained by it. I’ll keep this for some soul in worse need, as Rhun
says. It will have the virtue of his faith to strengthen it. I shall see you
both during the day.” She went away from him with a light,
springing step and a head reared to breathe in the very space and light of the
sky. And Cadfael went in to make sure he had everything ready to provide for a
long and exhausting day. So Rhun had arrived at the last frontier
of belief, and fallen, or emerged, or soared into the region where the soul
realises that pain is of no account, that to be within the secret of God is
more than well being, and past the power of the tongue to utter. To embrace the
decree of pain is to translate it, to shed it like a rain of blessing on others
who have not yet understood. Who am I, thought Cadfael, alone in the
solitude of his workshop, that I should dare to ask for a sign? If he can
endure and ask nothing, must not I be ashamed of doubting? Melangell passed with a dancing step along
the path from the herbarium. On her right hand the western sky soared, in such
reflected if muted brightness that she could not forbear from turning to stare
into it. A counter-tide of light flowed in here from the west, surging up the
slope from the brook and spilling over the crest into the garden. Somewhere on
the far side of the entire monastic enclave the two tides would meet, and the
light of the west falter, pale and die before the onslaught from the east; but
here the bulk of guest-hall and church cut off the newly-risen sun, and left
the field to this hesitant and soft-treading antidawn. There was someone labouring along the far
border of the flower-garden, going delicately on still tender feet, watching
where he trod. He was alone. No attendant shadow appeared at his back,
yesterday’s magic still held. She was staring at Ciaran, Ciaran without
Matthew. That in itself was a minor miracle, to bring in this day made for
miracles. Melangell watched him begin to descend the
slope towards the brook, and when he was no more than a head and shoulders
black against the brightness, she suddenly turned and went after him. The path
down to the water skirted the growing pease, keeping close to a hedge of thick
bushes above the mill-pool. Halfway down the slope she halted, uncertain
whether to intrude on his solitude. Ciaran had reached the waterside, and stood
surveying what looked like a safe green floor, dappled here and there with the
bleached islands of sand, and studded with a few embedded rocks that stood dry
from three weeks of fine weather. He looked upstream and down, even stepped
into the shallow water that barely covered his naked feet, and surely soothed
and refreshed them. Yet how strange, that he should be here alone! Never, until
yesterday, had she seen either of these two without the other, yet now they
went apart. She was on the point of stealing away to
leave him undisturbed when she saw what he was doing. He had some tiny thing in
his hand, into which he was threading a thin cord, and knotting the cord to
hold it fast. When he raised both hands to make fast the end of his cord to the
tether that held the cross about his neck, the small talisman swung free into
the light and glimmered for an instant in silver, before he tucked it away
within the neck of his shirt, out of sight against his breast. Then she knew
what it was, and stirred in pure pleasure for him, and uttered a small,
breathless sound. For Ciaran had his ring again, the safe-conduct that was to
ensure him passage to his journey’s end. He had heard her, and swung about,
startled and wary. She stood shaken and disconcerted, and then, knowing herself
discovered, ran down the last slope of grass to his side. “They’ve found it for
you!” she said breathlessly, in haste to fill the silence between them and
dispel her own uneasiness at having seemed to spy upon him. “Oh, I am glad! Is
the thief taken, then?” “Melangell!” he said. “You’re early
abroad, too? Yes, you see I am blessed, after all, I have it again. The lord
abbot restored it to me only some minutes ago. But no, the thief is not caught,
he and some fellow-rogues are fled into the woods, it seems. But I can go forth
again without fear now.” His dark eyes, deep-set under thick brows,
opened wide upon her, smiling, holding her charmed in the abrupt discovery that
he was, despite his disease, a young and comely man, who should have been in
the fulness of his powers. Either she was imagining it, or he stood a little
straighter, a little taller, than she had ever yet seen him, and the burning
intensity of his face had mellowed into a brighter, more human ardour, as if
some foreglow of the day’s spiritual radiance had given him new hope. “Melangell,” he said in a soft, vehement rush
of words, “you can’t guess how glad I am of this meeting, it was God sent you
here to me. I’ve long wanted to speak to you alone. Never think that because I
myself am doomed, I can’t see what’s before my eyes concerning others who are
dear to me. I have something to ask of you, to beg of you, most earnestly.
Don’t tell Matthew that I have my ring again!” “Does he not know?” she asked, astray. “No, he was not by when the abbot sent for
me. He must not know! Keep my secret, if you love him—if you have some pity, at
least for me. I have told no one, and you must not. The lord abbot is not
likely to speak of it to any other, why should he? That he would leave to me.
If you and I keep silent, there’s no need for anyone else to find out.” Melangell was lost. She saw him through a
rainbow of starting tears, for very pity of his long face hollowed in shade,
his eyes glowing like the quiet, living heart of a banked fire. “But why? Why do you want to keep it from
him?” “For his sake and yours—yes, and mine! Do
you think I have not understood long ago that he loves you?—that you feel as
much also for him? Only I stand in the way! It’s bitter to know it, and I would
have it changed. My one wish now is that you and he should be happy together.
If he loves me so faithfully, may not I also love him? You know him! He will
sacrifice himself, and you, and all things beside, to finish what he has
undertaken, and see me safe into Aberdaron. I don’t accept his sacrifice, I
won’t endure it! Why should you both be wretched, when my one wish is to go to
my rest in peace of mind and leave my friend happy? Now, while he feels secure
that I dare not set out without the ring, for God’s sake, girl, leave him in
innocence. And I will go, and leave you both my blessing.” Melangell stood quivering, like a leaf
shaken by the soft, vehement wind of his words, uncertain even of her own
heart. “Then what must I do? What is it you want of me?” “Keep my secret,” said Ciaran, “and go
with Matthew in this holy procession. Oh, he’ll go with you, and be glad. He
won’t wonder that I should stay behind and wait the saint’s coming here within
the pale. And while you’re gone, I’ll go on my way. My feet are almost healed,
I have my ring again, I shall reach my haven. You need not be afraid for me.
Only keep him happy as long as you may, and even when my going is known, then
use your arts, keep him, hold him fast. That’s all I shall ever ask of you.” “But he’ll know,” she said, alert to
dangers. “The porter will tell him you’re gone, as soon as he looks for you and
asks.” “No, for I shall go by this way, across
the brook and out to the west, for Wales. The porter will not see me go. See,
it’s barely ankle-deep in this season. I have kinsmen in Wales, the first miles
are nothing. And among so great a throng, if he does look for me, he’ll hardly
wonder at not finding me. Not for hours need he so much as think of me, if you
do your part. You take care of Matthew, I will absolve both you and him of all
care of me, for I shall do well enough. All the better for knowing I leave him
safe with you. For you do love him,” said Ciaran softly. “Yes,” said Melangell in a long sigh. “Then take and hold him, and my blessing
on you both. You may tell him—but well afterwards!—that it is what I designed
and intended,” he said, and suddenly and briefly smiled at some unspoken
thought he did not wish to share with her. “You will really do this for him and for
me? You mean it? You would go on alone for his sake… Oh, you are good!” she
said passionately, and caught at his hand and pressed it to her heart for an
instant, for he was giving her the whole world at his own sorrowful cost, and
for selfless love of his friend, and there might never be any time but this one
moment even to thank him. I’ll never forget your goodness. All my life long I
shall pray for you.” “No,” said Ciaran, the same dark smile
plucking at his lips as she released his hand, “forget me, and help him to
forget me. That is the best gift you can make me. And better you should not
speak to me again. Go and find him. That’s your part, and I depend on you.” She drew back from him a few paces, her
eyes still fixed on him in gratitude and worship, made him a strange little
reverence with head and hands, and turned obediently to climb the field into
the garden. By the time she reached level ground and began to thread the beds
of the rose garden she was breaking into a joyous run. They gathered in the great court as soon
as everyone, monk, lay servant, guest and townsman, had broken his fast. Seldom
had the court seen such a crowd, and outside the walls the Foregate was loud
with voices, as the guildsmen of Shrewsbury, provost, elders and all, assembled
to join the solemn procession that would set out for Saint Giles. Half of the
choir monks, led by Prior Robert, were to go in procession to fetch home the
reliquary, while the abbot and the remaining brothers waited to greet them with
music and candles and flowers on their return. As for the devout of town and
Foregate, and the pilgrims within the walls, they might form and follow Prior
Robert, such of them as were able-bodied and eager, while the lame and feeble
might wait with the abbot, and prove their devotion by labouring out at least a
little way to welcome the saint on her return. “I should so much like to go with them all
the way,” said Melangell, flushed and excited among the chattering, elbowing
crowd in the court. “It is not far. But too far for Rhun—he could not keep
pace.” He was there beside her, very silent, very
white, very fair, as though even his flaxen hair had turned paler at the
immensity of this experience. He leaned on his crutches between his sister and
Dame Alice, and his crystal eyes were very wide, and looked very far, as though
he was not even aware of their solicitude hemming him in on either side. Yet he
answered simply enough, “I should like to go a little way, at least, until they
leave me behind. But you need not wait for me.” “As though I would leave you!” said
Mistress Weaver, comfortably clucking. “You and I will keep together and see
the pilgrimage out to the best we can, and heaven will be content with that.
But the girl has her legs, she may go all the way, and put up a few prayers for
you going and returning, and we’ll none of us be the worse for it.” She leaned to twitch the neck of his shirt
and the collar of his coat into immaculate neatness, and to fuss over his
extreme pallor, afraid he was coming down with illness from over-excitement,
though he seemed tranquil as ivory, and serenely absent in spirit, gone
somewhere she could not follow. Her hand, rough-fingered from weaving, smoothed
his well-brushed hair, teasing every tendril back from his tall forehead. “Run off, then, child,” she said to
Melangell, without turning from the boy. “But find someone we know. There’ll be
riffraff running alongside, I dare say—no escaping them. Stay by Mistress
Glover, or the apothecary’s widow…” “Matthew is going with them,” said
Melangell, flushing and smiling at his very name. “He told me so. I met him
when we came from Prime.” It was only half-true. She had rather
confided boldly to him that she wished to tread every step of the way, and at
every step remember and intercede for the souls she most loved on earth. No
need to name them. He, no doubt, thought with reflected tenderness of her
brother; but she was thinking no less of this anguished pair whose fortunes she
now carried delicately and fearfully in her hands. She had even said, greatly
venturing, “Ciaran cannot keep pace, poor soul, he must wait here, like Rhun.
But can’t we make our steps count for them?” But for all that, Matthew had looked over
his shoulder, and hesitated a sharp instant before he turned his face fully to
her, and said abruptly: “Yes, we’ll go, you and I. Yes, let’s go that short way
together, surely I have the right, this once… I’ll make my prayers for Rhun
every step of the way.” “Trot and find him, then, girl,” said Dame
Alice, satisfied. “Matthew will take good care of you. See, they’re forming up,
you’d best hurry. We’ll be here to watch you come in.” Melangell fled, elated. Prior Robert had
drawn up his choir, with Brother Anselm the precentor at their head, facing the
gate. The shifting, murmuring, excited column of pilgrims formed up at his
rear, twitching like a dragon’s tail, a long, brightly-coloured, volatile
train, brave with flowers, lighted tapers, offerings, crosses and banners.
Matthew was waiting to reach out an eager hand to her and draw her in beside
him. “You have leave? She trusts you to me…?” “You’re not troubled about Ciaran?” she
could not forbear asking anxiously. “He’s right to stay here, he couldn’t
manage the walk.” The choir monks before them began their
processional psalm, Prior Robert led the way through the open gate, and after
him went the brothers in their ordered pairs, and after them the notabilities
of the town, and after them the long retinue of pilgrims, crowding forward
eagerly, picking up the chant where they had knowledge of it or a sensitive
ear, pouring out past the gatehouse and turning right towards Saint Giles. Brother Cadfael went with Prior Robert’s
party, with Brother Adam of Reading walking beside him. Along the broad road by
the enclave wall, past the great triangle of trodden grass at the horse-fair
ground, and again bearing right with the road, between scattered houses and
sun-bleached pastures and fields to the very edge of the suburb, where the
squat tower of the hospital church, the roof of the hospice, and the long
wattle fence of its garden showed dark against the bright eastern sky, slightly
raised from the road on a gentle green mound. And all the way the long train of
followers grew longer and more gaily-coloured, as the people of the Foregate in
their best holiday clothes came out from their dwellings and joined the
procession. There was no room in the small, dark church for more than the
brothers and the civic dignitaries of the town. The rest gathered all about the
doorway, craning to get a glimpse of the proceedings within. With his lips
moving almost soundlessly on the psalms and prayers, Cadfael watched the play
of candle-light on the silver tracery that ornamented Saint Winifred’s elegant
oak coffin, elevated there on the altar as when they had first brought it from
Gwytherin, four years earlier. He wondered whether his motive in securing for
himself a place among the eight brothers who would bear her back to the abbey
had been as pure as he had hoped. Had he been staking a proprietory claim on
her, as one who had been at her first coming? Or had he meant it as a humble
and penitential gesture? He was, after all, past sixty, and as he recalled, the
oak casket was heavy, its edges sharp on a creaky shoulder, and the way back
long enough to bring out all the potential discomforts. She might yet find a
way of showing him whether she approved his proceedings or no, by striking him
helpless with rheumatic pains! The office ended. The eight chosen
brothers, matched in height and pace, lifted the reliquary and settled it upon
their shoulders. The prior stooped his lofty head through the low doorway into
the mid-morning radiance, and the crowd clustered about the church opened to
make way for the saint to ride to her triumph. The procession reformed, Prior
Robert before with the brothers, the coffin with its bearers, flanked by
crosses and banners and candles, and eager women bringing garlands of flowers.
With measured pace, with music and solemn joy, Saint Winifred—or whatever
represented her there in the sealed and secret place—was borne back to her own
altar in the abbey church. Curious, thought Cadfael, carefully
keeping the step by numbers, it seems lighter than I remember. Is that
possible? In only four years? He was familiar with the curious propensities of
the body, dead or alive, he had once been led into a gallery of caverns in the
desert where ancient Christians had lived and died, he knew what dry air can do
to flesh, preserving the light and shrivelled shell while the juice of life was
drawn off into spirit. Whatever was there in the reliquary, it rode tranquilly
upon his shoulder, like a light hand guiding him. It was not heavy at all! Chapter Nine SOMETHING WONDERFUL HAPPENED along the way
to Matthew and Melangell, hemmed in among the jostling, singing, jubilant
train. Somewhere along that half-mile of road they were caught up in the fever
and joy of the day, borne along on the tide of music and devotion, forgetting
all others, forgetting even themselves, drawn into one without any word or
motion of theirs. When they turned their heads to look at each other, they saw
only mated eyes and a halo of sunshine. They did not speak at all, not once
along the way. They had no need of speech. But when they had turned the corner
of the precinct wall by the horse-fair, and drew near to the gatehouse, and
heard and saw the abbot leading his own party out to meet them, splendidly vested
and immensely tall under his mitre; when the two chants found their measure
while yet some way apart, and met and married in a triumphant, soaring cry of
worship, and all the ardent followers drew gasping breaths of exultation,
Melangell heard beside her a broken breath drawn, like a soft sob, that turned
as suddenly into a peal of laughter, out of pure, possessed joy. Not a loud
sound, muted and short of breath because the throat that uttered it was
clenched by emotion, and the mind and heart from which it came quite unaware of
what it shed upon the world. It was a beautiful sound, or so Melangell thought,
as she raised her head to stare at him with wide eyes and parted lips, in
dazzled and dazzling delight. Matthew’s wry and rare smile she had seen sometimes,
and wondered and grieved at its brevity, but never before had she heard him
laugh. The two processions merged. The
cross-bearers walked before, Abbot Radulfus, prior and choir monks came after,
and Cadfael and his peers with their sacred burden followed, hemmed in on both
sides by worshippers who reached and leaned to touch even the sleeve of a
bearer’s habit, or the polished oak of the reliquary as it passed. Brother
Anselm, in secure command of his choir, raised his own fine voice in the lead
as they turned in at the gatehouse, bringing Saint Winifred home. Brother Cadfael, by then, was moving like
a man in a dual dream, his body keeping pace and time with his fellows, in one
confident rhythm, while his mind soared in another, carried aloft on the cushioned
cloud of sounds, compounded of the eager footsteps, exalted murmurs and shrill
acclamations of hundreds of people, with the chant borne above it, and the
voice of Brother Anselm soaring over all. The great court was crowded with
people to watch them enter, the way into the cloister, and so into the church,
had to be cleared by slow, shuffling paces, the ranks pressing back to give
them passage, Cadfael came to himself with some mild annoyance when the
reliquary was halted in the court, to wait for a clear path ahead. He braced
both feet almost aggressively into the familiar soil, and for the first time
looked about him. He saw, beyond the throng already gathered, the saint’s own
retinue melting and flowing to find a place where eye might see all, and ear
hear all. In this brief halt he saw Melangell and Matthew, hand in hand, hunt
round the fringes of the crowd, and find a place to gaze. They looked to Cadfael a little tipsy,
like unaccustomed drinkers after strong wine. And why not? After long abstention
he had felt the intoxication possessing his own feet, as they held the hypnotic
rhythm, and his own mind, as it floated on the cadences of song. Those
ecstasies were at once native and alien to him, he could both embrace and stand
clear of them, feet firmly planted, gripping the homely earth, to keep his
balance and stand erect. They moved forward again into the nave of
the church, and then to the right, towards the bared and waiting altar. The
vast, dreaming, sun-warmed bulk of the church enclosed them, dim, silent and
empty, since no other could enter until they had discharged their duty, lodged
their patroness and retired to their own insignificant places. Then they came,
led by abbot and prior, first the brothers to fill up their stalls in the choir,
then the provost and guildsmen of the town and the notables of the shire, and
then all that great concourse of people, flooding in from hot mid-morning
sunlight to the cool dimness of stone, and from the excited clamour of festival
to the great silence of worship, until all the space of the nave was filled
with the colour and warmth and breath of humanity, and all as still as the
candle-flames on the altar. Even the reflected gleams in the silver chacings of
the casket were fixed and motionless as jewels. Abbot Radulfus stood forth. The sobering
solemnity of the Mass began. For the very intensity of all that mortal
emotion gathered thus between confining walls and beneath one roof, it was
impossible to withdraw the eyes for an instant from the act of worship on which
it was centred, or the mind from the words of the office. There had been times,
through the years of his vocation, when Cadfael’s thoughts had strayed during
Mass to worrying at other problems, and working out other intents. It was not
so now. Throughout, he was unaware of a single face in all that throng, only of
the presence of humankind, in whom his own identity was lost; or, perhaps, into
whom his own identity expanded like air, to fill every part of the whole. He
forgot Melangell and Matthew, he forgot Ciaran and Rhun, he never looked round
to see if Hugh had come. If there was a face before his mind’s eye at all it
was one he had never seen, though he well remembered the slight and fragile
bones he had lifted with such care and awe out of the earth, and with so much
better heart again laid beneath the same soil, there to resume her
hawthorn-scented sleep under the sheltering trees. For some reason, though she
had lived to a good old age, he could not imagine her older than seventeen or eighteen,
as she had been when the king’s son Cradoc pursued her. The slender little
bones had cried out of youth, and the shadowy face he had imagined for her was
fresh and eager and open, and very beautiful. But he saw it always half turned
away from him. Now, if ever, she might at last look round, and show him fully
that reassuring countenance. At the end of Mass the abbot withdrew to
his own stall, to the right of the entrance from nave to choir, round the
parish altar, and with lifted voice and open arms bade the pilgrims advance to
the saint’s altar, where everyone who had a petition to make might make it on
his knees, and touch the reliquary with hand and lip. And in orderly and
reverent silence they came. Prior Robert took his stand at the foot of the three
steps that led up to the altar, ready to offer a hand to those who needed help
to mount or kneel. Those who were in health and had no pressing requirements to
advance came through from the nave on the other side, and found corners where
they might stand and watch, and miss nothing of this memorable day. They had
faces again, they spoke in whispers, they were as various as an hour since they
had been one. On his knees in his stall, Brother Cadfael
looked on, knowing them one from another now as they came, kneeled and touched.
The long file of petitioners was drawing near its end when he saw Rhun
approaching. Dame Alice had a hand solicitously under his left elbow, Melangell
nursed him along on his right, Matthew followed close, no less anxious than they.
The boy advanced with his usual laborious gait, his dragging toe just scraping
the tiles of the floor. His face was intensely pale, but with a brilliant
pallor that almost dazzled the watching eyes, and the wide gaze he fixed
steadily upon the reliquary shone translucent, like ice with a bright bluish
light behind it. Dame Alice was whispering low, encouraging entreaties into one
ear, Melangell into the other, but he was aware of nothing but the altar
towards which he moved. When his turn came, he shook off his supporters, and
for a moment seemed to hesitate before venturing to advance alone. Prior Robert observed his condition, and
held out a hand. “You need not be abashed, my son, because you cannot kneel.
God and the saint will know your goodwill.” The softest whisper of a voice, though
clearly audible in the waiting silence, said tremulously: “But, Father, I can!
I will!” Rhun straightened up, taking his hands
from his crutches, which slid from under his armpits and fell. That on the left
crashed with an unnerving clatter upon the tiles, on the right Melangell
started forward and dropped to her knees, catching the falling prop in her arms
with a faint cry. And there she crouched, embracing the discarded thing
desperately, while Rhun set his twisted foot to the ground and stood upright.
He had but two or three paces to go to the foot of the altar steps. He took
them slowly and steadily, his eyes fixed upon the reliquary. Once he lurched
slightly, and Dame Alice made a trembling move to run after him, only to halt
again in wonder and fear, while Prior Robert again extended his hand to offer
aid. Rhun paid no attention to them or to anyone else, he did not seem to see
or hear anything but his goal, and whatever voice it might be that called him
forward. For he went with held breath, as a child learning to walk ventures
across perilous distances to reach its mother’s open arms and coaxing, praising
blandishments that wooed it to the deed. It was the twisted foot he set first on
the lowest step, and now the twisted foot, though a little awkward and
unpractised, was twisted no longer, and did not fail him, and the wasted leg,
as he put his weight on it, seemed to have smoothed out into shapeliness, and
bore him up bravely. Only then did Cadfael become aware of the
stillness and the silence, as if every soul present held his breath with the
boy, spellbound, not yet ready, not yet permitted to acknowledge what they saw
before their eyes. Even Prior Robert stood charmed into a tall, austere statue,
frozen at gaze. Even Melangell, crouching with the crutch hugged to her breast,
could not stir a finger to help or break the spell, but hung upon every
deliberate step with agonised eyes, as though she were laying her heart under
his feet as a voluntary sacrifice to buy off fate. He had reached the third step, he sank to
his knees with only the gentlest of manipulations, holding by the fringes of
the altar frontal, and the cloth of gold that was draped under the reliquary.
He lifted his joined hands and starry face, white and bright even with eyes now
closed, and though there was hardly any sound they saw his lips moving upon
whatever prayers he had made ready for her. Certainly they contained no request
for his own healing. He had put himself simply in her hands, submissively and
joyfully, and what had been done to him and for him surely she had done, of her
own perfect will. He had to hold by her draperies to rise,
as babes hold by their mothers’ skirts. No doubt but she had him under the arms
to raise him. He bent his fair head and kissed the hem of her garment, rose
erect and kissed the silver rim of the reliquary, in which, whether she lay or
not, she alone commanded and had sovereignty. Then he withdrew from her,
feeling his way backward down the three steps. Twisted foot and shrunken leg
carried him securely. At the foot he made obeisance gravely, and then turned
and went briskly, like any other healthy lad of sixteen, to smile reassurance
on his trembling womenfolk, take up gently the crutches for which he had no
further use, and carry them back to lay them tidily under the altar. The spell broke, for the marvellous thing
was done, and its absolute nature made manifest. A great, shuddering sigh went
round nave, choir, transepts and all, wherever there were human creatures watching
and listening. And after the sigh the quivering murmur of a gathering storm,
whether of tears or laughter there was no telling, but the air shook with its
passion. And then the outcry, the loosing of both tears and laughter, in a gale
of wonder and praise. From stone walls and lofty, arched roof, from rood-loft
and transept arcades, the echoes flew and rebounded, and the candles that had
stood so still and tall shook and guttered in the gale. Melangell hung weak
with weeping and joy in Matthew’s arms, Dame Alice whirled from friend to
friend, spouting tears like a fountain, and smiling like the most blessed of
women. Prior Robert lifted his hands in vindicated stewardship, and his voice
in the opening of a thanksgiving psalm, and Brother Anselm took up the chant. A miracle, a miracle, a miracle… And in the midst Rhun stood erect and
still, even a little bewildered, braced sturdily on his two long, shapely legs,
looking all about him at the shouting, weeping, exulting faces, letting the
meaningless sounds wash over him in waves, wanting the quiet he had known when
there had been no one here in this holy place but himself and his saint, who
had told him, in how sweet and private conference, all that he had to do. Brother Cadfael rose with his brothers,
after the church was cleared of all others, after all that jubilant, bubbling,
boiling throng had gone forth to spill its feverish excitement in open summer
air, to cry the miracle aloud, carry it out into the Foregate, beyond into the
town, buffet it back and forth across the tables at dinner in the guest-hall,
and return to extol it at Vespers with what breath was left. When they
dispersed the word would go with them wherever they went, sounding Saint
Winifred’s praises, inspiring other souls to take to the roads and bring their
troubles to Shrewsbury. Where healing was proven, and attested by hundreds of
voices. The brothers went to their modest,
accustomed dinner in the refectory, and observed, whatever their own feelings
were, the discipline of silence. They were very tired, which made silence
welcome. They had risen early, worked hard, been through fire and flood body
and soul, no wonder they ate humbly, thankfully, in silence. Chapter Ten IT WAS NOT UNTIL DINNER was almost over in
the guest-hall that Matthew, seated at Melangell’s side and still flushed and
exalted from the morning’s heady wonders, suddenly bethought him of sterner
matters, and began to look back with a thoughtful frown which as yet only
faintly dimmed the unaccustomed brightness of his face. Being in attendance on
Mistress Weaver and her young people had made him a part, for a while, of their
unshadowed joy, and caused him to forget everything else. But it could not
last, though Rhun sat there half-lost in wonder still, with hardly a word to
say, and felt no need of food or drink, and his womenfolk fawned on him
unregarded. So far away had he been that the return took time. “I haven’t seen Ciaran,” said Matthew
quietly in Melangell’s ear, and he rose a little in his place to look round the
crowded room. “Did you catch ever a glimpse of him in the church?” She, too, had forgotten until then, but at
sight of his face she remembered all too sharply, with a sickening lurch of her
heart. But she kept her countenance, and laid a persuasive hand on his arm to
draw him down again beside her. “Among so many? But he surely would be there.
He must have been among the first, he stayed here, he would find a good place.
We didn’t see all those who went to the altar—we all stayed with Rhun, and his place
was far back.” Such a mingling of truth and lies, but she kept her voice
confident, and clung to her shaken hope. “But where is he now? I don’t see him
within here.” Though there was so much excitement, so much moving about from
table to table to talk with friends, that one man might easily avoid detection.
“I must find him,” said Matthew, not yet greatly troubled but wanting
reassurance, and rose. “No, sit down! You know he must be here
somewhere. Let him alone, and he’ll appear when he chooses. He may be resting
on his bed, if he has to go forth again barefoot tomorrow. Why look for him
now? Can you not do without him even one day? And such a day?” Matthew looked down at her with a face
from which all the openness and joy had faded, and freed his sleeve from her
grasp gently enough, but decidedly. “Still, I must find him. Stay here with
Rhun, I’ll come back. All I want is to see him, to be sure…” He was away, slipping quietly out between
the festive tables, looking sharply about him as he went. She was in two minds
about following him, but then she thought better of it, for while he hunted
time would be slipping softly away, and Ciaran would be dwindling into
distance, as later she prayed he could fade even out of mind, and be forgotten.
So she remained with the happy company, but not of it, and with every passing
moment hesitated whether to grow more reassured or more uneasy. At last she
could not bear the waiting any longer. She rose quietly and slipped away. Dame
Alice was in full spate, torn between tears and smiles, sitting proudly by her
prodigy, and surrounded by neighbours as happy and voluble as herself, and
Rhun, still somehow apart though he was the centre of the group, sat withdrawn
into his revelation, even as he answered eager questions, lamely enough but as
well as he could. They had no need of Melangell, they would not miss her for a
little while. When she came out into the great court,
into the brilliance of the noonday sun, it was the quietest hour, the pause
after meat. There never was a time of day when there was no traffic about the
court, no going and coming at the gatehouse, but now it moved at its gentlest
and quietest. She went down almost fearfully into the cloister, and found no
one there but a single copyist busy reviewing what he had done the previous
day, and Brother Anselm in his workshop going over the music for Vespers; into
the stable-yard, though there was no reason in the world why Matthew should be
there, having no mount, and no expectation that his companion would or possibly
could acquire one; into the gardens, where a couple of novices were clipping
back the too exuberant shoots of a box hedge; even into the grange court, where
the barns and storehouses were, and a few lay servants were taking their ease,
and harrowing over the morning’s marvel, like everyone else within the enclave,
and most of Shrewsbury and the Foregate into the bargain. The abbot’s garden
was empty, neat, glowing with carefully-tended roses, his lodging showed an
open door, and some ordered bustle of guests within. She turned back towards the garden, now in
deep anxiety. She was not good at lying, she had no practice, even for a good
end she could not but botch the effort. And for all the to and fro of customary
commerce within the pale, never without work to be done, she had seen nothing
of Matthew. But he could not be gone, no, the porter could tell him nothing,
Ciaran had not passed there; and she would not, never until she must, never
until Matthew’s too fond heart was reconciled to loss, and open and receptive
to a better gain. She turned back, rounding the box hedge
and out of sight of the busy novices, and walked breast to breast into Matthew. They met between the thick hedges, in a
terrible privacy. She started back from him in a brief revulsion of guilt, for
he looked more distant and alien than ever before, even as he recognised her,
and acknowledged with a contortion of his troubled face her right to come out
in search of him, and almost in the same instant frowned her off as irrelevant. “He’s gone!” he said in a chill and
grating voice, and looked through her and far beyond. “God keep you, Melangell,
you must fend for yourself now, sorry as I am. He’s gone, fled while my back
was turned. I’ve looked for him everywhere, and never a trace of him. Nor has
the porter seen him pass the gate, I’ve asked there. But he’s gone! Alone! And
I must go after him. God keep you, girl, as I cannot, and fare you well!” And he was going so, with so few words and
so cold and wild a face! He had turned on his heel and taken two long steps
before she flung herself after him, caught him by the arms in both hands, and
dragged him to a halt. “No, no, why? What need has he of you, to
match with my need? He’s gone? Let him go! Do you think your life belongs to
him? He doesn’t want it! He wants you free, he wants you to live your own life,
not die his death with him. He knows, he knows you love me! Dare you deny it?
He knows I love you. He wants you happy! Why should not a friend want his
friend to be happy? Who are you to deny him his last wish?” She knew by then that she had said too
much, but never knew at what point the error had become mortal. He had turned
fully to her again, and frozen where he stood, and his face was like chiselled
marble. He tugged his sleeve out of her grasp this time with no gentleness at
all. “He wants!” hissed a voice she had never
heard before, driven through narrowed lips. “You’ve spoken with him! You speak
for him! You knew! You knew he meant to go, and leave me here bewitched,
damned, false to my oath. You knew! When? When did you speak with him?” He had her by the wrists, he shook her
mercilessly, and she cried out and fell to her knees. “You knew he meant to go?” persisted
Matthew, stooping over her in a cold frenzy. “Yes, yes! This morning he told me… he
wished it…” “He wished it! How dared he wish it? How
could he dare, robbed of his bishop’s ring as he was? He dared not stir without
it, he was terrified to set foot outside the pale…” “He has the ring,” she cried, abandoning
all deceit. “The lord abbot gave it back to him this morning, you need not fret
for him, he’s safe enough, he has his protection… He doesn’t need you!” Matthew had fallen into a deadly
stillness, stooping above her. “He has the ring? And you knew it, and never
said word! If you know so much, how much more do you know. Speak! Where is he?” “Gone,” she said in a trembling whisper,
“and wished you well, wished us both well… wished us to be happy… Oh, let him
go, let him go, he sets you free!” Something that was certainly a laugh
convulsed Matthew, she heard it with her ears and felt it shiver through her
flesh, but it was like no other laughter she had ever heard, it chilled her
blood. “He sets me free! And you must be his confederate! Oh, God! He never
passed the gate. If you know all, then tell all—how did he go?” She faltered, weeping: “He loved you, he
willed you to live and forget him, and be happy…” “How did he go?” repeated Matthew, in a
voice so ill-supplied with breath it seemed he might strangle on the words. “Across the brook,” she said in a broken
whisper, “making the quickest way for Wales. He said… he has kin there…” He drew in hissing breath and took his
hands from her, leaving her drooping forward on her face as he let go of her
wrists. He had turned his back and flung away from her, all they had shared
forgotten, his obsession plucking him away. She did not understand, there was
no way she could come to terms so rapidly with all that had happened, but she
knew she had loosed her hold of her love, and he was in merciless flight from
her in pursuit of some incomprehensible duty in which she had no part and no
right. She sprang up and ran after him, caught
him by the arm, wound her own arms about him, lifted her imploring face to his
stony, frantic stare, and prayed him passionately: “Let him go! Oh, let him go!
He wants to go alone and leave you to me…” Almost silently above her the terrible
laughter, so opposed to that lovely sound as he followed the reliquary with
her, boiled like some thick, choking syrup in his throat. He struggled to shake
off her clinging hands, and when she fell to her knees again and hung upon him
with all her despairing weight he tore loose his right hand, and struck her
heavily in the face, sobbing, and so wrenched himself loose and fled, leaving
her face-down on the ground. In the abbot’s lodging Radulfus and his
guests sat long over their meal, for they had much to discuss. The topic which
was on everyone’s lips naturally came first. “It would seem,” said the abbot, “that we
have been singularly favoured this morning. Certain motions of grace we have
seen before, but never yet one so public and so persuasive, with so many
witnesses. How do you say? I grow old in experience of wonders, some of which
turn out to fall somewhat short of their promise. I know of human deception,
not always deliberate, for sometimes the deceiver is himself deceived. If
saints have power, so have demons. Yet this boy seems to me as crystal. I
cannot think he either cheats or is cheated.” “I have heard,” said Hugh, “of cripples
who discarded their crutches and walked without them, only to relapse when the
fervour of the occasion was over. Time will prove whether this one takes to his
crutches again.” “I shall speak with him later,” said the
abbot, “after the excitement has cooled. I hear from Brother Edmund that
Brother Cadfael has been treating the boy these three days he has been here.
That may have eased his condition, but it can scarcely have brought about so
sudden a cure. No, I must say it, I truly believe our house has been the happy
scene of divine grace. I will speak also with Cadfael, who must know the boy’s
condition.” Olivier sat quiet and deferential in the
presence of so reverend a churchman as the abbot, but Hugh observed that his
arched lids lifted and his eyes kindled at Cadfael’s name. So he knew who it
was he sought, and something more than a distant salute in action had passed
between that strangely assorted pair. “And now I should be glad,” said the
abbot, “to hear what news you bring from the south. Have you been in
Westminster with the empress’s court? For I hear she is now installed there.” Olivier gave his account of affairs in
London readily, and answered questions with goodwill. “My lord has remained in
Oxford, it was at his wish I undertook this errand. I was not in London, I set
out from Winchester. But the empress is in the palace of Westminster, and the
plans for her coronation go forward, admittedly very slowly. The city of London
is well aware of its power, and means to exact due recognition of it, or so it
seems to me.” He would go no nearer than that to voicing whatever qualms he
felt about his liege lady’s wisdom or want of it, but he jutted a dubious
underlip, and momentarily frowned. “Father, you were there at the council, you
know all that happened. My lord lost a good knight there, and I a valued
friend, struck down in the street.” “Rainald Bossard,” said Radulfus sombrely.
“I have not forgotten.” “Father, I have been telling the lord
sheriff here what I should like to tell also to you. For I have a second errand
to pursue, wherever I go on the business of the empress, an errand for
Rainald’s widow. Rainald had a young kinsman in his household, who was with him
when he was killed, and after that death this young man left the lady’s service
without a word, secretly. She says he had grown closed and silent even before
he vanished, and the only trace of him afterwards was on the road to Newbury,
going north. Since then, nothing. So knowing I was bound north, she begged me
to enquire for him wherever I came, for she values and trusts him, and needs
him at her side. I may not deceive you, Father, there are those who say he has
fled because he is guilty of Rainald’s death. They claim he was besotted with
Dame Juliana, and may have seized his chance in this brawl to widow her, and
get her for himself, and then taken fright because these things were so soon
being said. But I think they were not being said at all until after he had
vanished. And Juliana, who surely knows him better than any, and looks upon him
as a son, for want of children of her own, she is quite sure of him. She wants
him home and vindicated, for whatever reason he left her as he did. And I have
been asking at every lodging and monastery along the road for word of such a
young man. May I also ask here? Brother Hospitaller will know the names of all
his guests. Though a name,” he added ruefully, “is almost all I have, for if
ever I saw the man it was without knowing it was he. And the name he may have
left behind him.” “It is not much to go on,” said Abbot
Radulfus with a smile, “but certainly you may enquire. If he has done no wrong,
I should be glad to help you to find him and bring him off without reproach.
What is his name?” “Luc Meverel. Twenty-four years old, they
tell me, middling tall and well made, dark of hair and eye.” “It could fit many hundreds of young men,”
said the abbot, shaking his head, “and the name I doubt he will have put off if
he has anything to hide, or even if he fears it may be unfairly besmirched. Yet
try. I grant you in such a gathering as we have here now a young man who wished
to be lost might bury himself very thoroughly. Denis will know which of his
guests is of the right age and quality. For clearly your Luc Meverel is
well-born, and most likely tutored and lettered.” “Certainly so,” said Olivier. “Then by all means, and with my blessing,
go freely to Brother Denis, and see what he can do to help you. He has an
excellent memory, he will be able to tell you which, among the men here, is of
suitable years, and gentle. You can but try.” On leaving the lodging they went first,
however, to look for Brother Cadfael. And Brother Cadfael was not so easily
found. Hugh’s first resort was the workshop in the herbarium, where they
habitually compounded their affairs. But there was no Cadfael there. Nor was he
with Brother Anselm in the cloister, where he well might have been debating
some nice point in the evening’s music. Nor checking the medicine cupboard in
the infirmary, which must surely have been depleted during these last few days,
but had clearly been restocked in the early hours of this day of glory. Brother
Edmund said mildly: “He was here. I had a poor soul who bled from the mouth,
too gorged, I think, with devotion. But he’s quiet and sleeping now, the flux
has stopped. Cadfael went away some while since.” Brother Oswin, vigorously fighting weeds
in the kitchen garden, had not seen his superior since dinner. “But I think,”
he said, blinking thoughtfully into the sun in the zenith, “he may be in the
church.” Cadfael was on his knees at the foot of
Saint Winifred’s three-tread stairway to grace, his hands not lifted in prayer
but folded in the lap of his habit, his eyes not closed in entreaty but wide
open to absolution. He had been kneeling there for some time, he who was
usually only too glad to rise from knees now perceptibly stiffening. He felt no
pains, no griefs of any kind, nothing but an immense thankfulness in which he
floated like a fish in an ocean. An ocean as pure and blue and drowningly deep and
clear as that well-remembered eastern sea, the furthest extreme of the tideless
midland sea of legend, at the end of which lay the holy city of Jerusalem, Our
Lord’s burial-place and hard-won kingdom. The saint who presided here, whether
she lay here or no, had launched him into a shining infinity of hope. Her
mercies might be whimsical, they were certainly magisterial. She had reached
her hand to an innocent, well deserving her kindness. What had she intended
towards this less innocent but no less needy being? Behind him, approaching quietly from the
nave, a known voice said softly: “And are you demanding yet a second miracle?” He withdrew his eyes reluctantly from the
reflected gleams of silver along the reliquary, and turned to look towards the
parish altar. He saw the expected shape of Hugh Beringar, the thin dark face
smiling at him. But over Hugh’s shoulder he saw a taller head and shoulders
loom, emerging from dimness in suave, resplendent planes, the bright, jutting
cheekbones, the olive cheeks smoothly hollowed below, the falcon’s amber eyes
beneath high-arched black brows, the long, supple lips tentatively smiling upon
him. It was not possible. Yet he beheld it.
Olivier de Bretagne came out of the shadows and stepped unmistakable into the
light of the altar candles. And that was the moment when Saint Winifred turned
her head, looked fully into the face of her fallible but faithful servant, and
also smiled. A second miracle! Why not? When she gave
she gave prodigally, with both hands. Chapter Eleven THEY WENT OUT INTO THE CLOISTER all three
together, and that in itself was memorable and good, for they had never been
together before. Those trusting intimacies which had once passed between
Cadfael and Olivier, on a winter night in Bromfield priory, were unknown still
to Hugh, and there was a mysterious constraint still that prevented Olivier
from openly recalling them. The greetings they exchanged were warm but brief,
only the reticence behind them was eloquent, and no doubt Hugh understood that
well enough, and was willing to wait for enlightenment, or courteously to make
do without it. For that there was no haste, but for Luc Meverel there might be. “Our friend has a quest,” said Hugh, “in
which we mean to enlist Brother Denis’s help, but we shall also be very glad of
yours. He is looking for a young man by the name of Luc Meverel, strayed from
his place and known to be travelling north. Tell him the way of it, Olivier.” Olivier told the story over again, and was
listened to with close attention. “Very gladly,” said Cadfael then, “would I do
whatever man can do not only to bring off an innocent man from such a charge,
but also to bring the charge home to the guilty. We know of this murder, and it
sticks in every gullet that a decent man, protecting his honourable opponent,
should be cut down by one of his own faction…” “Is that certain?” wondered Hugh sharply. “As good as certain. Who else would so
take exception to the man standing up for his lady and doing his errand without
fear? All who still held to Stephen in their hearts would approve, even if they
dared not applaud him. And as for a chance attack by sneak-thieves, why choose
to prey on a mere clerk, with nothing of value on him but the simple needs of
his journey, when the town was full of nobles, clerics and merchants far better
worth robbing? Rainald died only because he came to the clerk’s aid. No, an
adherent of the empress, like Rainald himself but most unlike, committed that
infamy.” “That’s good sense,” agreed Olivier. “But
my chief concern now is to find Luc, and send him home again if I can.” “There must be twenty or more young
fellows in that age here today,” said Cadfael, scrubbing thoughtfully at his
blunt brown nose, “but I dare wager most of them can be pricked out of the list
as well known to some of their companions by their own right names, or by
reason of their calling or condition. Solitaries may come, but they’re few and
far between. Pilgrims are like starlings, they thrive on company. We’d best go
and talk to Brother Denis. He’ll have sorted out most of them by now.” Brother Denis had a retentive memory and
an appetite for news and rumours that usually kept him the best-informed person
in the enclave. The fuller his halls, the more pleasure he took in knowing
everything that went on there, and the name and vocation of every guest. He
also kept meticulous books to record the visitations. They found him in the narrow cell where he
kept his accounts and estimated his future needs, thoughtfully reckoning up
what provisions he still had, and how rapidly the demands on them were likely
to dwindle from the morrow. He took his mind from his store-book courteously in
order to listen to what Brother Cadfael and the sheriff required of him, and
produced answers with exemplary promptitude when asked to sieve out from his
swollen household males of about twenty-five years, bred gentle or within
modest reach of gentility, lettered, of dark colouring and medium tall build,
answering to the very bare description of Luc Meverel. As his forefinger flew
down the roster of his guests the numbers shrank remarkably. It seemed to be
true that considerably more than half of those who went on pilgrimage were
women, and that among the men the greater part were in their forties or
fifties, and of those remaining, many would be in minor orders, either
monastics or secular priests or would-be priests. And Luc Meverel was none of
these. “Are there any here,” asked Hugh, viewing
the final list, which was short enough, “who came solitary?” Brother Denis cocked his round, rosy,
tonsured head aside and ran a sharp brown eye, very remiscent of a robin’s,
down the list. “Not one. Young squires of that age seldom go as pilgrims,
unless with an exigent lord—or an equally exigent lady. In such a summer feast
as this we might have young friends coming together, to take the fill of the
time before they settle down to sterner disciplines. But alone… Where would be
the pastime in that?” “Here are two, at any rate,” said Cadfael,
“who came together, but surely not for pastime. They have puzzled me, I own.
Both are of the proper age, and such word as we have of the man we’re looking
for would fit either. You know them, Denis, that youngster who’s on his way to
Aberdaron, and his friend who bears him company. Both lettered, both bred to
the manor. And certainly they came from the south, beyond Abingdon, according
to Brother Adam of Reading, who lodged there the same night.” “Ah, the barefoot traveller,” said Denis,
and laid a finger on Ciaran in the shrunken toll of young men, “and his keeper
and worshipper. Yes, I would not put half a year between them, and they have
the build and colouring, but you needed only one.” “We could at least look at two,” said
Cadfael. “If neither of them is what we’re seeking, yet coming from that region
they may have encountered such a single traveller somewhere on the road. If we
have not the authority to question them closely about who they are and whence
they come, and how and why thus linked, then Father Abbot has. And if they have
no reason to court concealment, then they’ll willingly declare to him what they
might not as readily utter to us.” “We may try it,” said Hugh, kindling. “At
least it’s worth the asking, and if they have nothing to do with the man we are
looking for, neither they nor we have lost more than half an hour of time, and
surely they won’t grudge us that.” “Granted what is so far related of these
two hardly fits the case,” Cadfael acknowledged doubtfully, “for the one is
said to be mortally ill and going to Aberdaron to die, and the other is
resolute to keep him company to the end. But a young man who wishes to
disappear may provide himself with a circumstantial story as easily as with a
new name. And at all events, between Abingdon and Shrewsbury it’s possible they
may have encountered Luc Meverel alone and under his own name.” “But if one of these two, either of these
two, should truly be the man I want,” said Olivier doubtfully, “then who, in
the name of God, is the other?” “We ask each other questions,” said Hugh
practically, “which either of these two could answer in a moment. Come, let’s
leave Abbot Radulfus to call them in, and see what comes of it.” It was not difficult to induce the abbot
to have the two young men sent for. It was not so easy to find them and bring
them to speak for themselves. The messenger, sent forth in expectation of
prompt obedience, came back after a much longer time than had been expected,
and reported ruefully that neither of the pair could be found within the abbey
walls. True, the porter had not actually seen either of them pass the
gatehouse. But what had satisfied him that the two were leaving was that the
young man Matthew had come, no long time after dinner, to reclaim his dagger,
and had left behind him a generous gift of money to the house, saying that he
and his friend were already bound away on their journey, and desired to offer
thanks for their lodging. And had he seemed, it was Cadfael who asked it,
himself hardly knowing why, had he seemed as he always was, or in any way
disturbed or alarmed or out of countenance and temper, when he came for his
weapon and paid his and his friend’s score? The messenger shook his head, having asked
no such question at the gate. Brother Porter, when enquiry was made direct by
Cadfael himself, said positively: “He was like a man on fire. Oh, as soft as
ever in voice, and courteous, but pale and alight, you’d have said his hair
stood on end. But what with every soul within here wandering in a dream, since
this wonder, I never thought but here were some going forth with the news while
the furnace was still white-hot.” “Gone?” said Olivier, dismayed, when this
word was brought back to the abbot’s parlour. “Now I begin to see better cause
why one of these two, for all they come so strangely paired, and so strangely
account for themselves, may be the man I’m seeking. For if I do not know Luc
Meverel by sight, I have been two or three times his lord’s guest recently, and
he may well have taken note of me. How if he saw me come, today, and is gone
hence thus in haste because he does not wish to be found? He could hardly know
I am sent to look for him, but he might, for all that, prefer to put himself
clean out of sight. And an ailing companion on the way would be good cover for
a man wanting a reason for his wanderings. I wish I might yet speak with these
two. How long have they been gone?” “It cannot have been more than an hour and
a half after noon,” said Cadfael, “according to when Matthew reclaimed his
dagger.” “And afoot!” Olivier kindled hopefully.
“And even unshod, the one of them! It should be no great labour to overtake
them, if it’s known what road they will have taken.” “By far their best way is by the Oswestry
road, and so across the dyke into Wales. According to Brother Denis, that was
Ciaran’s declared intent.” “Then, Father Abbot,” said Olivier
eagerly, “with your leave I’ll mount and ride after them, for they cannot have
got far. It would be a pity to miss the chance, and even if they are not what
I’m seeking, neither they nor I will have lost anything. But with or without my
man, I shall return here.” “I’ll ride through the town with you,”
said Hugh, “and set you on your way, for this will be new country to you. But
then I must be about my own business, and see if we’ve gathered any harvest
from this morning’s hunt. I doubt they’ve gone deeper into the forest, or I
should have had word by now. We shall look for you back before night, Olivier.
One more night at the least we mean to keep you and longer if we can.” Olivier took his leave hastily but
gracefully, made a dutiful reverence to the abbot, and turned upon Brother
Cadfael a brief, radiant smile that shattered his preoccupation for an instant
like a sunburst through clouds. “I will not leave here,” he said in simple
reassurance, “without having quiet conference with you. But this I must see
finished, if I can.” They were gone away briskly to the
stables, where they had left their horses before Mass. Abbot Radulfus looked
after them with a very thoughtful face. “Do you find it surprising, Cadfael, that
these two young pilgrims should leave so soon, and so abruptly? Is it possible
the coming of Messire de Bretagne can have driven them away?” Cadfael considered, and shook his head.
“No, I think not. In the great press this morning, and the excitement, why
should one man among the many be noticed, and one not looked for at all in
these parts? But, yes, their going does greatly surprise me. For the one, he
should surely be only too glad of an extra day or two of rest before taking
barefoot to the roads again. And for the other, Father, there is a girl he
certainly admires and covets, whether he yet knows it to the full or no, and
with her he spent this morning, following Saint Winifred home, and I am certain
there was then no other thought in his mind but of her and her kin, and the
greatness of this day. For she is sister to the boy Rhun, who came by so great
a mercy and blessing before our eyes. It would take some very strong compulsion
to drag him away suddenly like this.” “The boy’s sister, you say?” Abbot
Radulfus recalled an intent which had been shelved in favour of Olivier’s
quest. There is still an hour or more before Vespers. I should like to talk
with this youth. You have been treating his condition, Cadfael. Do you think
your handling has had anything to do with what we witnessed today? Or could he,
though I would not willingly attribute falsity to one so young, could he have
made more of his distress than it was, in order to produce a prodigy?” “No,” said Cadfael very decidedly. “There
is no deceit at all in him. And as for my poor skills, they might in a long
time of perseverance have softened the tight cords that hampered the use of his
limb, and made it possible to set a little weight on it, but straighten that
foot and fill out the sinews of the leg, never! The greatest doctor in the
world could not have done it. Father, on the day he came I gave him a draught
that should have eased his pain and brought him sleep. After three nights he
sent it back to me untouched. He saw no reason why he should expect to be
singled out for healing, but he said that he offered his pain freely, who had
nothing else to give. Not to buy grace, but of his goodwill to give and want
nothing in return. And further, it seems that thus having accepted his pain out
of love, his pain left him. After Mass we saw that deliverance completed.” “Then it was well deserved,” said
Radulfus, pleased and moved. “I must indeed talk with this boy. Will you find
him for me, Cadfael, and bring him here to me now?” “Very gladly, Father,” said Cadfael, and
departed on his errand. Dame Alice was sitting in the sunshine of
the cloister garth, the centre of a voluble circle of other matrons, her face
so bright with the joy of the day that it warmed the very air; but Rhun was not
with them. Melangell had withdrawn into the shadow of the arcade, as though the
light was too bright for her eyes, and kept her face averted over the mending
of a frayed seam in a linen shirt which must belong to her brother. Even when
Cadfael addressed her she looked up only very swiftly and timidly, and again
stooped into shadow, but even in that glimpse he saw that the joy which had
made her shine like a new rose in the morning was dimmed and pale now in the
lengthening afternoon. And was he merely imagining that her left cheek showed
the faint bluish tint of a bruise? But at the mention of Rhun’s name she
smiled, as though at the recollection of happiness rather than its presence. “He said he was tired, and went away into
the dortoir to rest. Aunt Weaver thinks he is lying down on his bed, but I
think he wanted only to be left alone, to be quiet and not have to talk. He is
tired by having to answer things he seems not to understand himself.” “He speaks another tongue today from the
rest of mankind,” said Cadfael. “It may well be we who don’t understand, and
ask things that have no meaning for him.” He took her gently by the chin and
turned her face up to the light, but she twisted nervously out of his hold.
“You have hurt yourself?” Certainly it was a bruise beginning there. “It’s nothing,” she said. “My own fault. I
was in the garden, I ran too fast and I fell. I know it’s unsightly, but it
doesn’t hurt now.” Her eyes were very calm, not reddened,
only a little swollen as to the lids. Well, Matthew had gone, abandoned her to
go with his friend, letting her fall only too disastrously after the heady
running together of the morning hours. That could account for tears now past.
But should it account for a bruised cheek? He hesitated whether to question
further, but clearly she did not wish it. She had gone back doggedly to her
work, and would not look up again. Cadfael sighed, and went out across the
great court to the guest-hall. Even a glorious day like this one must have its
vein of bitter sadness. In the men’s dortoir Rhun sat alone on his
bed, very still and content in his blissfully restored body. He was deep in his
own rapt thoughts, but readily aware when Cadfael entered. He looked round and
smiled. “Brother, I was wishing to see you. You
were there, you know. Perhaps you even heard… See, how I’m changed!” The leg
once maimed stretched out perfect before him, he bent and stamped the boards of
the floor. He flexed ankle and toes, drew up his knee to his chin, and
everything moved as smoothly and painlessly as his ready tongue. “I am whole! I
never asked it, how dared I? Even then, I was praying not for this, and yet
this was given…” He went away again for a moment into his tranced dream. Cadfael sat down beside him, noting the
exquisite fluency of those joints hitherto flawed and intransigent. The boy’s
beauty was perfected now. “You were praying,” said Cadfael gently,
“for Melangell.” “Yes. And Matthew too. I truly thought…
But you see he is gone. They are both gone, gone together. Why could I not
bring my sister into bliss? I would have gone on crutches all my life for that,
but I couldn’t prevail.” “That is not yet determined,” said Cadfael
firmly. “Who goes may also return. And I think your prayers should have strong
virtue, if you do not fall into doubt now, because heaven has need of a little
time. Even miracles have their times. Half our lives in this world are spent in
waiting. It is needful to wait with faith.” Rhun sat listening with an absent smile,
and at the end of it he said: “Yes, surely, and I will wait. For see, one of
them left this behind in his haste when he went away.” He reached down between the close-set
cots, and lifted to the bed between them a bulky but lightweight scrip of
unbleached linen, with stout leather straps for the owner’s belt. “I found it
dropped between the two beds they had, drawn close together. I don’t know which
of them owned this one, the two they carried were much alike. But one of them
doesn’t expect or want ever to come back, does he? Perhaps Matthew does, and
has forgotten this, whether he meant it or no, as a pledge.” Cadfael stared and wondered, but this was
a heavy matter, and not for him. He said seriously: “I think you should bring
this with you, and give it into the keeping of Father Abbot. For he sent me to
bring you to him. He wants to speak with you.” “With me?” wavered Rhun, stricken into a
wild and rustic child again. “The lord abbot himself?” “Surely, and why not? You are Christian
soul as he is, and may speak with him as equal.” The boy faltered: “I should be afraid…” “No, you would not. You are not afraid of
anything, nor need you ever be.” Rhun sat for a moment with fists doubled
into the blanket of his bed; then he lifted his clear, ice-blue gaze and
blanched, angelic face and smiled blindingly into Cadfael’s eyes. “No, I need
not. I’ll come.” And he hoisted the linen scrip and stood up stately on his two
long, youthful legs, and led the way to the door. “Stay with us,” said Abbot Radulfus, when
Cadfael would have presented his charge and left the two of them together. “I
think he might be glad of you.” Also, said his eloquent, austere glance, your
presence may be of value to me as witness. “Rhun knows you. Me he does not yet
know, but I trust he shall, hereafter.” He had the drab, brownish scrip on the
desk before him, offered on entry with a word to account for it, until the time
came to explore its possibilities further. “Willingly, Father,” said Cadfael
heartily, and took his seat apart on a stool withdrawn into a corner, out of
the way of those two pairs of formidable eyes that met, and wondered, and
probed with equal intensity across the small space of the parlour. Outside the
windows the garden blossomed with drunken exuberance, in the burning colours of
summer, and the blanched blue sky, at its loftiest in the late afternoon,
showed the colour of Rhun’s eyes, but without their crystal blaze. The day of
wonders was drawing very slowly and radiantly towards its evening. “Son,” said Radulfus at his gentlest, “you
have been the vessel for a great mercy poured out here. I know, as all know who
were there, what we saw, what we felt. But I would know also what you passed
through. I know you have lived long with pain, and have not complained. I dare
guess in what mind you approached the saint’s altar. Tell me, what was it
happened to you then?” Rhun sat with his empty hands clasped
quietly in his lap, and his face at once remote and easy, looking beyond the
walls of the room. All his timidity was lost. “I was troubled,” he said carefully,
“because my sister and my Aunt Alice wanted so much for me, and I knew I needed
nothing. I would have come, and prayed, and passed, and been content. But then
I heard her call.” “Saint Winifred spoke to you?” asked
Radulfus softly. “She called me to her,” said Rhun
positively. “In what words?” “No words. What need had she of words? She
called me to go to her, and I went. She told me, here is a step, and here, and
here, come, you know you can. And I knew I could, so I went. When she told me,
kneel, for so you can, then I kneeled, and I could. Whatever she told me, that
I did. And so I will still,” said Rhun, smiling into the opposing wall with
eyes that paled the sun. “Child,” said the abbot, watching him in
solemn wonder and respect, “I do believe it. What skills you have, what gifts
to stead you in your future life, I scarcely know. I rejoice that you have to
the full the blessing of your body, and the purity of your mind and spirit. I
wish you whatever calling you may choose, and the virtue of your resolve to
guide you in it. If there is anything you can ask of this house, to aid you
after you go forth from here, it is yours.” “Father,” said Rhun earnestly, withdrawing
his blinding gaze into shadow and mortality, and becoming the child he was,
“need I go forth? She called me to her, how tenderly I have no words to tell. I
desire to remain with her to my life’s end. She called me to her, and I will
never willingly leave her.” Chapter Twelve “AND WILL YOU KEEP HIM?” asked Cadfael,
when the boy had been dismissed, made his deep reverence, and departed in his
rapt, unwitting perfection. “If his intent holds, yes, surely. He is
the living proof of grace. But I will not let him take vows in haste, to regret
them later. Now he is transported with joy and wonder, and would embrace
celibacy and seclusion with delight. If his will is still the same in a month,
then I will believe in it, and welcome him gladly. But he shall serve his full
notiviate, even so. I will not let him close the door upon himself until he is
sure. And now,” said the abbot, frowning down thoughtfully at the linen scrip
that lay upon his desk, “what is to be done with this? You say it was fallen
between the two beds, and might have belonged to either?” “So the boy said. But, Father, if you
remember, when the bishop’s ring was stolen, both those young men gave up their
scrips to be examined. What each of them carried, apart from the dagger that
was duly delivered over at the gatehouse, I cannot say with certainty, but
Father Prior, who handled them, will know.” “True, so he will. But for the present,”
said Radulfus, “I cannot think we have any right to probe into either man’s
possessions, nor is it of any great importance to discover to which of them
this belongs. If Messire de Bretagne overtakes them, as he surely must, we
shall learn more, he may even persuade them to return. We’ll wait for his word
first. In the meantime, leave it here with me.
When we know more we’ll take whatever steps we can to restore it.” The day of wonders drew in to its evening
as graciously as it had dawned, with a clear sky and soft, sweet air. Every
soul within the enclave came dutifully to Vespers, and supper in the guest-hall
as in the refectory was a devout and tranquil feast. The voices hasty and
shrill with excitement at dinner had softened and eased into the grateful
languor of fulfilment. Brother Cadfael absented himself from
Collations in the chapter house, and went out into the garden. On the gentle
ridge where the gradual slope of the pease fields began he stood for a long
while watching the sky. The declining sun had still an hour or more of its
course to run before its rim dipped into the feathery tops of the copses across
the brook. The west which had reflected the dawn as this day began triumphed
now in pale gold, with no wisp of cloud to dye it deeper or mark its purity.
The scent of the herbs within the walled garden rose in a heady cloud of
sweetness and spice. A good place, a resplendent day, why should any man slip
away and run from it? A useless question. Why should any man do
the things he does? Why should Ciaran submit himself to such hardship? Why
should he profess such piety and devotion, and yet depart without leave-taking
and without thanks in the middle of so auspicious a day? It was Matthew who had
left a gift of money on departure. Why could not Matthew persuade his friend to
stay and see out the day? And why should he, who had glowed with excited joy in
the morning, and run hand in hand with Melangell, abandon her without remorse
in the afternoon, and resume his harsh pilgrimage with Ciaran as if nothing had
happened? Were they two men or three? Ciaran,
Matthew and Luc Meverel? What did he know of them, all three, if three they
were? Luc Meverel had been seen for the last time south of Newbury, walking
north towards that town, and alone. Ciaran and Matthew were first reported, by
Brother Adam of Reading, coming from the south into Abingdon for their night’s
lodging, two together. If one of them was Luc Meverel, then where and why had
he picked up his companion, and above all, who was his companion? By this time, surely Olivier should have
overhauled his quarry and found the answers to some of these questions. And he
had said he would return, that he would not leave Shrewsbury without having
some converse with a man remembered as a good friend. Cadfael took that
assurance to his heart, and was warmed. It was not the need to tend any of his
herbal potions or bubbling wines that drew him to walk on to his workshop, for
Brother Oswin, now in the chapter house with his fellows, had tidied everything
for the night, and seen the brazier safely out. There was flint and tinder
there in a box, in case it should be necessary to light it again in the night
or early in the morning. It was rather that Cadfael had grown accustomed to
withdrawing to his own special solitude to do his best thinking, and this day
had given him more than enough cause for thought, as for gratitude. For where
were his qualms now? Miracles may be spent as frequently on the undeserving as
on the deserving. What marvel that a saint should take the boy Rhun to her
heart, and reach out her sustaining hand to him? But the second miracle was
doubly miraculous, far beyond her sorry servant’s asking, stunning in its
generosity. To bring him back Olivier, whom he had resigned to God and the great
world, and made himself content never to see again! And then Hugh’s voice,
unwitting herald of wonders, said out of the dim choir, “And are you demanding
yet a second miracle?” He had rather been humbling himself in wonder and thanks
for one, demanding nothing more; but he had turned his head, and beheld
Olivier. The western sky was still limpid and
bright, liquid gold, the sun still clear of the treetops, when he opened the
door of his workshop and stepped within, into the timber-warm, herb-scented
dimness. He thought and said afterwards that it was at that moment he saw the
inseparable relationship between Ciaran and Matthew suddenly overturned,
twisted into its opposite, and began, in some enclosed and detached part of his
intelligence, to make sense of the whole matter, however dubious and flawed the
revelation. But he had no time to catch and pin down the vision, for as his
foot crossed the threshold there was a soft gasp somewhere in the shadowy
corner of the hut, and a rustle of movement, as if some wild creature had been
disturbed in its lair, and shrunk into the last fastness to defend itself. He halted, and set the door wide open
behind him for reassurance that there was a possibility of escape. “Be easy!”
he said mildly. “May I not come into my own workshop without leave? And should
I be entering here to threaten any soul with harm?” His eyes, growing accustomed rapidly to
the dimness, which seemed dark only by contrast with the radiance outside,
scanned the shelves, the bubbling jars of wine in a fat row, the swinging,
rustling swathes of herbs dangling from the beams of the low roof. Everything
took shape and emerged into view. Stretched along the broad wooden bench
against the opposite wall, a huddle of tumbled skirts stirred slowly and reared
itself upright, to show him the spilled ripe-corn gold of a girl’s hair, and
the tear-stained, swollen-lidded countenance of Melangell. She said no word, but she did not drop
blindly into her sheltering arms again. She was long past that, and past being
afraid to show herself so to one secret, quiet creature whom she trusted. She
set down her feet in their scuffed leather shoes to the floor, and sat back
against the timbers of the wall, bracing slight shoulders to the solid contact.
She heaved one enormous, draining sigh that was dragged up from her very heels,
and left her weak and docile. When he crossed the beaten earth floor and sat
down beside her, she did not flinch away. “Now,” said Cadfael, settling himself with
deliberation, to give her time to compose at least her voice. The soft light
would spare her face. “Now, child dear, there is no one here who can either
save you or trouble you, and therefore you can speak freely, for everything you
say is between us two only. But we two together need to take careful counsel.
So what is it you know that I do not know?” “Why should we take counsel?” she said in
a small, drear voice from below his solid shoulder. “He is gone.” “What is gone may return. The roads lead
always two ways, hither as well as yonder. What are you doing out here alone,
when your brother walks erect on two sound feet, and has all he wants in this
world, but for your absence?” He did not look directly at her, but felt
the stir of warmth and softness through her body, which must have been a smile,
however flawed. “I came away,” she said, very low, “not to spoil his joy. I’ve
borne most of the day. I think no one has noticed half my heart was gone out of
me. Unless it was you,” she said, without blame, rather in resignation. “I saw you when we came from Saint Giles,”
said Cadfael, “you and Matthew. Your heart was whole then, so was his. If yours
is torn in two now, do you suppose his is preserved without wound? No! So what
passed, afterwards? What was this sword that shore through your heart and his?
You know! You may tell it now. They are gone, there is nothing left to spoil.
There may yet be something to save.” She turned her forehead into his shoulder
and wept in silence for a little while. The light within the hut grew rather
than dimming, now that his eyes were accustomed. She forgot to hide her forlorn
and bloated face, he saw the bruise on her cheek darkening into purple. He laid
an arm about her and drew her close for the comfort of the flesh. That of the
spirit would need more of time and thought. “He struck you?” “I held him,” she said, quick in his
defence. “He could not get free.” “And he was so frantic? He must go?” “Yes, whatever it cost him or me. Oh,
Brother Cadfael, why? I thought, I believed he loved me, as I do him. But see
how he used me in his anger!” “Anger?” said Cadfael sharply, and turned
her by the shoulders to study her more intently. “Whatever the compulsion on
him to go with his friend, why should he be angry with you? The loss was yours,
but surely no blame.” “He blamed me for not telling him,” she
said drearily. “But I did only what Ciaran asked of me. For his sake and yours,
he said, yes, and for mine, too, let me go, but hold him fast. Don’t tell him I
have the ring again, he said, and I will go. Forget me, he said, and help him
to forget me. He wanted us to remain together and be happy…” “Are you telling me,” demanded Cadfael
sharply, “that they did not go together! That Ciaran made off without him?” “It was not like that,” sighed Melangell.
“He meant well by us, that’s why he stole away alone…” “When was this? When? When did you have
speech with him? When did he go?” “I was here at dawn, you’ll remember. I
met Ciaran by the brook…” She drew a deep, desolate breath and loosed the whole
flood of it, every word she could recall of that meeting in the early morning,
while Cadfael gazed appalled, and the vague glimpse he had had of enlightenment
awoke and stirred again in his mind, far clearer now. “Go on! Tell me what followed between you
and Matthew. You did as you were bidden, I know, you drew him with you, I doubt
he ever gave a thought to Ciaran all those morning hours, believing him still
penned withindoors, afraid to stir. When was it he found out?” “After dinner it came into his mind that
he had not seen him. He was very uneasy. He went to look for him everywhere… He
came to me here in the garden. “God keep you, Melangell,” he said, “you must
fend for yourself now, sorry as I am…” Almost every word of that encounter she
had by heart, she repeated them like a tired child repeating a lesson. “I said
too much, he knew I had spoken with Ciaran, he knew that I knew he’d meant to
go secretly…” “And then, after you had owned as much?” “He laughed,” she said, and her very voice
froze into a despairing whisper. “I never heard him laugh until this morning,
and then it was such a sweet sound. But this laughter was not so! Bitter and
raging.” She stumbled through the rest of it, every word another fine line
added to the reversed image that grew in Cadfael’s mind, mocking his memory. “He
sets me free!” And “You must be his confederate!” The words were so burned on
her mind that she even reproduced the savagery of their utterance. And how few
words it took, in the end, to transform everything, to turn devoted attendance
into remorseless pursuit, selfless love into dedicated hatred, noble
self-sacrifice into calculated flight, and the voluntary mortification of the
flesh into body armour which must never be doffed. He heard again, abruptly and piercingly,
Ciaran’s wild cry of alarm as he clutched his cross to him, and Matthew’s voice
saying softly: “Yet he should doff it. How else can he truly be rid of his
pains?” How else, indeed! Cadfael recalled, too,
how he had reminded them both that they were here to attend the feast of a
saint who might have life itself within her gift, “even for a man already
condemned to death!” Oh, Saint Winifred, stand by me now, stand by us all, with
a third miracle to better the other two! He took Melangell brusquely by the chin,
and lifted her face to him. “Girl, look to yourself now for a while, for I must
leave you. Do up your hair and keep a brave face, and go back to your kin as
soon as you can bear their eyes on you. Go into the church for a time, it will
be quiet there now, and who will wonder if you give a longer time to your
prayers? They will not even wonder at past tears, if you can smile now. Do as
well as you can, for I have a thing I must do.” There was nothing he could promise her, no
sure hope he could leave with her. He turned from her without another word,
leaving her staring after him between dread and reassurance, and went striding
in haste through the gardens and out across the court, to the abbot’s lodging. If Radulfus was surprised to have Cadfael
ask audience again so soon, he gave no sign of it, but had him admitted at
once, and put aside his book to give his full attention to whatever this fresh
business might be. Plainly it was something very much to the current purpose
and urgent. “Father,” said Cadfael, making short work
of explanations, “there’s a new twist here. Messire de Bretagne has gone off on
a false trail. Those two young men did not leave by the Oswestry road, but
crossed the Meole brook and set off due west to reach Wales the nearest way.
Nor did they leave together. Ciaran slipped away during the morning, while his
fellow was with us in the procession, and Matthew has followed him by the same
way as soon as he learned of his going. And, Father, there’s good cause to
think that the sooner they’re overtaken and halted, the better surely for one,
and I believe for both. I beg you, let me take a horse and follow. And send
word of this to Hugh Beringar in the town, to come after us on the same trail.” Radulfus received all this with a grave
but calm face, and asked no less shortly: “How did you come by this word?” “From the girl who spoke with Ciaran
before he departed. No need to doubt it is all true. And, Father, one more
thing before you bid me go. Open, I beg you, that scrip they left behind, let
me see if it has anything more to tell us of this pair, at the least, of one of
them.” Without a word or an instant of
hesitation, Radulfus dragged the linen scrip into the light of his candles, and
unbuckled the fastening. The contents he drew out fully upon the desk, sparse
enough, what the poor pilgrim would carry, having few possessions and desiring
to travel light. “You know, I think,” said the abbot,
looking up sharply, “to which of the two this belonged?” “I do not know, but I guess. In my mind I
am sure, but I am also fallible. Give me leave!” With a sweep of his hand he spread the
meagre belongings over the desk. The purse, thin enough when Prior Robert had
handled it before, lay flat and empty now. The leather-bound breviary,
well-used, worn but treasured, had been rolled into the folds of the shirt, and
when Cadfael reached for it the shirt slid from the desk and fell to the floor.
He let it lie as he opened the book. Within the cover was written, in a clerk’s
careful hand, the name of its owner: Juliana Bossard. And below, in newer ink
and a less practised hand: Given to me, Luc Meverel, this Christmastide, 1140.
God be with us all! “So I pray, too,” said Cadfael, and
stooped to pick up the fallen shirt. He held it up to the light, and his eye
caught the thread-like outline of a stain that rimmed the left shoulder. His
eye followed the line over the shoulder, and found it continued down and round
the left side of the breast. The linen, otherwise, was clean enough, bleached
by several launderings from its original brownish natural colouring. He spread
it open, breast up, on the desk. The thin brown line, sharp on its outer edge,
slightly blurred within, hemmed a great space spanning the whole left part of
the chest and the upper part of the left sleeve. The space within the outline had
been washed clear of any stain, even the rim was pale, but it stood clear to be
seen, and the scattered shadowings of colour within it preserved a faint hint
of what had been there. Radulfus, if he had not ventured as far
afield in the world as Cadfael, had nevertheless stored up some experience of
it. He viewed the extended evidence and said composedly, “This was blood.” “So it was,” said Cadfael, and rolled up
the shirt. “And whoever owned this scrip came from
where a certain Juliana Bossard was chatelaine.” His deep eyes were steady and
sombre on Cadfael’s face. “Have we entertained a murderer in our house?” “I think we have,” said Cadfael, restoring
the scattered fragments of a life to their modest lodging. A man’s life, shorn
of all expectation of continuance, even the last coin gone from the purse. “But
I think we may have time yet to prevent another killing, if you give me leave
to go.” “Take the best of what may be in the
stable,” said the abbot simply, “and I will send word to Hugh Beringar, and have
him follow you, and not alone.” Chapter Thirteen SEVERAL MILES NORTH on the Oswestry road,
Olivier drew rein by the roadside where a wiry, bright-eyed boy was grazing
goats on the broad verge, lush in summer growth and coming into seed. The child
twitched one of his long leads on his charges, to bring him along gently where
the early evening light lay warm on the tall grass. He looked up at the rider
without awe, half-Welsh and immune from servility. He smiled and gave an easy
good evening. The boy was handsome, bold, unafraid; so
was the man. They looked at each other and liked what they saw. “God be with you!” said Olivier. “How long
have you been pasturing your beasts along here? And have you in all that time
seen a lame man and a well man go by, the pair of them much of my age, but
afoot?” “God be with you, master,” said the boy
cheerfully. “Here along this verge ever since noon, for I brought my bit of
dinner with me. But I’ve seen none such pass. And I’ve had a word by the road
with every soul that did go by, unless he were galloping.” “Then I waste my hurrying,” said Olivier,
and idled a while, his horse stooping to the tips of the grasses. “They cannot
be ahead of me, not by this road. See, now, supposing they wished to go earlier
into Wales, how may I bear round to pick them up on the way? They went from
Shrewsbury town ahead of me, and I have word to bring to them. Where can I turn
west and fetch a circle about the town?” The young herdsman accepted with open arms
every exchange that refreshed his day’s labour. He gave his mind to the best
road offering, and delivered judgement: “Turn back but a mile or more, back
across the bridge at Montford, and then you’ll find a well-used cart-track that
bears off west, to your right hand it will be. Bear a piece west again where
the paths first branch, it’s no direct way, but it does go on. It skirts
Shrewsbury a matter of above four miles outside the town, and threads the edges
of the forest, but it cuts across every path out of Shrewsbury. You may catch your
men yet. And I wish you may!” “My thanks for that,” said Olivier “and
for your advice also.” He stooped to the hand the boy had raised, not for alms
but to caress the horse’s chestnut shoulder with admiration and pleasure, and
slipped a coin into the smooth palm. “God be with you!” he said, and wheeled
his mount and set off back along the road he had travelled. “And go with you, master!” the boy called
after him, and watched until a curve of the road took horse and rider out of
sight beyond a stand of trees. The goats gathered closer; evening was near, and
they were ready to turn homeward, knowing the hour by the sun as well as did
their herder. The boy drew in their tethers, whistled to them cheerily, and
moved on along the road to his homeward path through the fields. Olivier came for the second time to the
bridge over the Severn, one bank a steep, tree-clad escarpment, the other open,
level meadow. Beyond the first plane of fields a winding track turned off to
the right, between scattered stands of trees, bearing at this point rather
south than west, but after a mile or more it brought him on to a better road
that crossed his track left and right. He bore right into the sun, as he had
been instructed, and at the next place where two dwindling paths divided he
turned left, and keeping his course by the sinking sun on his right hand, now
just resting upon the rim of the world and glimmering through the trees in
sudden blinding glimpses, began to work his way gradually round the town of
Shrewsbury. The tracks wound in and out of copses, the fringe woods of the
northern tip of the Long Forest, sometimes in twilight among dense trees,
sometimes in open heath and scrub, sometimes past islets of cultivated fields
and glimpses of hamlets. He rode with ears pricked for any promising sound,
pausing wherever his labyrinthine path crossed a track bearing westward out of
Shrewsbury, and wherever he met with cottage or assart he asked after his two
travellers. No one had seen such a pair pass by. Olivier took heart. They had
had some hours start of him, but if they had not passed westward by any of the
roads he had yet crossed, they might still be within the circle he was drawing
about the town. The barefoot one would not find these ways easy going, and
might have been forced to take frequent rests. At the worst, even if he missed
them in the end, this meandering route must bring him round at last to the
highroad by which he had first approached Shrewsbury from the south-east, and
he could ride back into the town to Hugh Beringar’s welcome, none the worse for
a little exercise in a fine evening. Brother Cadfael had wasted no time in
clambering into his boots, kilting his habit, and taking and saddling the best
horse he could find in the stables. It was not often he had the chance to
indulge himself with such half-forgotten delights, but he was not thinking of
that now. He had left considered word with the messenger who was already
hurrying across the bridge and into the town, to alert Hugh; and Hugh would ask
no questions, as the abbot had asked none, recognising the grim urgency there
was no leisure now to explain. “Say to Hugh Beringar,” the order ran,
“that Ciaran will make for the Welsh border the nearest way, but avoiding the
too open roads. I think he’ll bear south a small way to the old road the Romans
made, that we’ve been fools enough to let run wild, for it keeps a steady level
and makes straight for the border north of Caus.” That was drawing a bow at a venture, and
he knew it, none better. Ciaran was not of these parts, though he might well
have some knowledge of the borderland if he had kin on the Welsh side. But more
than that, he had been here these three days past, and if he had been planning
some such escape all that time, he could have picked the brains of brothers and
guests, on easily plausible ground. Time pressed, and sound guessing was
needed. Cadfael chose his way, and set about pursuing it. He did not waste time in going decorously
out at the gatehouse and round by the road to take up the chase westward, but
led his horse at a trot through the gardens, to the blank astonishment of
Brother Jerome, who happened to be crossing to the cloisters a good ten minutes
early for Compline. No doubt he would report, with a sense of outrage, to Prior
Robert. Cadfael as promptly forgot him, leading the horse round the unharvested
pease field and down to the quiet green stretches of the brook, and across to
the narrow meadow, where he mounted. The sun was dipping its rim beyond the
crowns of the trees to westward. Into that half-shine, half-shadow Cadfael
spurred, and made good speed while the tracks were familiar to him as his own
palm. Due west until he hit the road, a half-mile on the road at a canter,
until it turned too far to the south, and then westward again for the setting
sun. Ciaran had a long start, even of Matthew, let alone of all those who
followed now. But Ciaran was lame, burdened and afraid. Almost he was to be
pitied. Half a mile further on, at an
inconspicuous track which he knew, Cadfael again turned to bear south-west, and
burrowed into deepest shade, and into the northernmost woodlands of the Long
Forest. No more than a narrow forest ride, this, between sweeping branches, a
fragment of ancient wood not worth clearing for an assart, being bedded on rock
that broke surface here and there. This was not yet border country, but close
kin to it, heaving into fretful outcrops that broke the thin soil, bearing
heather and coarse upland grasses, scrub bushes and sparsity trees, then
bringing forth prodigal life roofed by very old trees in every wet hollow. A
little further on this course, and the close, dark woods began, tall top cover,
heavy interweaving of middle growth, and a tangle of bush and bramble and
ground-cover below. Undisturbed forest, though there were rare islands of
tillage bright and open within it, every one an astonishment. Then he came to the old, old road, that
sliced like a knife across his path, heading due east, due west. He wondered
about the men who had made it. It was shrunken now from a soldiers’ road to a
narrow ride, mostly under thin turf, but it ran as it had always run since it
was made, true and straight as a lance, perfectly levelled where a level was
possible, relentlessly climbing and descending where some hummock barred the way.
Cadfael turned west into it, and rode straight for the golden upper arc of sun
that still glowed between the branches. In the parcel of old forest north and west
of the hamlet of Hanwood there were groves where stray outlaws could find ample
cover, provided they stayed clear of the few settlements within reach. Local
people tended to fence their holdings and band together to protect their own
small ground. The forest was for plundering, poaching, pasturing of swine, all
with secure precautions. Travellers, though they might call on hospitality and
aid where needed, must fend for themselves in the thicker coverts, if they
cared to venture through them. By and large, safety here in Shropshire under
Hugh Beringar was as good as anywhere in England, and encroachment by vagabonds
could not survive long, but for brief occupation the cover was there, and
unwanted tenants might take up occupation if pressed. Several of the lesser manors in these
border regions had declined by reason of their perilous location, and some were
half-deserted, leaving their fields untilled. Until April of this year the
border castle of Caus had been in Welsh hands, an added threat to peaceful
occupation, and there had not yet been time since Hugh’s reclamation of the
castle for the depleted hamlets to re-establish themselves. Moreover, in this
high summer it was no hardship to live wild, and skilful poaching and a little
profitable thievery could keep two or three good fellows in meat while they
allowed time for their exploits in the south to be forgotten, and made up their
minds where best to pass the time until a return home seemed possible. Master Simeon Poer, self-styled merchant
of Guildford, was not at all ill-content with the pickings made in Shrewsbury.
In three nights, which was the longest they dared reckon on operating
unsuspected, they had taken a fair amount of money from the hopeful gamblers of
the town and Foregate, besides the price Daniel Aurifaber had paid for the
stolen ring, the various odds and ends William Hales had abstracted from market
stalls, and the coins John Shure had used his long, smooth, waxed finger-nails
to extract from pocket and purse in the crowds. It was a pity they had had to
leave William Hales to his fate during the raid, but all in all they had done
well to get out of it with no more than a bruise or two, and one man short. Bad
luck for William, but it was the way the lot had fallen. Every man knew it
could happen to him. They had avoided the used tracks,
refraining from meddling with any of the local people going about their
business, and done their plundering by night and stealthily, after first making
sure where there were dogs to be reckoned with. They even had a roof of sorts,
for in the deepest thickets below the old road, overgrown and well-concealed,
they had found the remains of a hut, relic of a failed assart abandoned long
ago. After a few days more of this easy living, or if the weather should
change, they would set off to make their way somewhat south, to be well clear
of Shrewsbury before moving across to the east, to shires where they were not
yet known. When the rare traveller came past on the
road, it was almost always a local man, and they let him alone, for he would be
missed all too soon, and the hunt would be up in a day. But they would not have
been averse to waylaying any solitary who was clearly a stranger and on his way
to more distant places, since he was unlikely to be missed at once, and
further, he was likely to be better worth robbing, having on him the means to
finance his journey, however modestly. In these woods and thickets, a man could
vanish very neatly, and for ever. They had made themselves comfortable that
night outside their hut, with the embers of their fire safe in the clay-lined
hollow they had made for it, and the grease of the stolen chicken still on
their fingers. The sunset of the outer world was already twilight here, but
they had their night eyes, and were wide awake and full of restless energy
after an idle day. Walter Bagot was charged with keeping such watch as they
thought needful, and had made his way in cover some distance along the narrow
track towards the town. He came sliding back in haste, but shining with
anticipation instead of alarm. “Here’s one coming we may safely pick off.
The barefoot fellow from the abbey… well back as yet, and lame as ever, he’s
been among the stones, surely. Not a soul will know where he went to.” “He?” said Simeon Poer, surprised. “Fool,
he has always his shadow breathing down his neck. It would mean both, if one
got away he’d raise the hunt on us.” “He has not his shadow now,” said Bagot
gleefully. “Alone, I tell you, he’s shaken him off, or else they’ve parted by
consent. Who else cares a groat what becomes of him?” “And a groat’s his worth,” said Shure
scornfully. “Let him go. It’s never worth it for his hose and shirt, and what
else can he have on him?” “Ah, but he has! Money, my friend!” said
Bagot, glittering. “Make no mistake, that one goes very well provided, if he
takes good care not to let it be known. I know! I’ve felt my way about him
every time I could get crowded against him in church, he has a solid, heavy
purse belted about him inside coat, hose, shirt and all, but I never could get
my fingers into it without using the knife, and that was too risky. He can pay
his way wherever he goes. Come, rouse, he’ll be an easy mark now.” He was certain, and they were heartily
willing to pick up an extra purse. They rose merrily, hands on daggers, worming
their way quietly through the underbrush towards the thin thread of the track,
above which the ribbon of clear sky showed pale and bright still. Shure and
Bagot lurking invisible on the near side of the path, Simeon Poer across it,
behind the lush screen of bushes that took advantage of the open light to grow
leafy and tall. There were very old trees in their tract of forest, enormous
beeches with trunks so gnarled and thick three men with arms outspread could
hardly clip them. Old woodland was being cleared, assarted and turned into
hunting-grounds in many places, but the Long Forest still preserved large
tracts of virgin growth untouched. In the green dimness the three masterless
men stood still as the trees, and waited. Then they heard him. Dogged, steady,
laborious steps that stirred the coarse grasses. In the turfed verge of a
highroad he could have gone with less pain and covered twice the miles he had
accomplished on these rough ways. They heard his heavy breathing while he was
still twenty yards away from them, and saw his tall, dark figure stir the
dimness, leaning forward on a long, knotty staff he had picked up somewhere
from among the debris of the trees. It seemed that he favoured the right foot,
though both trod with wincing tenderness, as though he had trodden askew on a
sharp-edged stone, and either cut his sole or twisted his ankle-joint. He was
piteous, if there had been anyone to pity him. He went with ears pricked, and the very
hairs of his skin erected, in as intense wariness as any of the small nocturnal
creatures that crept and quaked in the underbrush around him. He had walked in
fear every step of the miles he had gone in company, but now, cast loose to his
own dreadful company, he was even more afraid. Escape was no escape at all. It was the extremity of his fear that
saved him. They had let him pass slowly by the first covert, so that Bagot
might be behind him, and Poer and Shure one on either side before him. It was
not so much his straining ears as the prickly sensitivity of his skin that
sensed the sudden rushing presence at his back, the shifting of the cool
evening air, and the weight of body and arm launched at him almost silently. He
gave a muted shriek and whirled about, sweeping the staff around him, and the
knife that should have impaled him struck the branch and sliced a ribbon of
bark and wood from it. Bagot reached with his left hand for a grip on sleeve or
coat, and struck again as nimbly as a snake, but missed his hold as Ciaran
leaped wildly back out of reach, and driven beyond himself by terror, turned
and plunged away on his lacerated feet, aside from the path and into the
deepest and thickest shadows among the tangled trees. He hissed and moaned with
pain as he went, but he ran like a startled hare. Who would have thought he could still move
so fast, once pushed to extremes? But he could not keep it up long, the spur
would not carry him far. The three of them went after, spreading out a little
to hem him from three sides when he fell exhausted. They were giggling as they
went, and in no special haste. The mingled sounds of his crashing passage
through the bushes and his uncontrollable whining with the pain of it, rang
unbelievably strangely in the twilit woods. Branches and brambles lashed Ciaran’s
face. He ran blindly, sweeping the long staff before him, cutting a noisy
swathe through the bushes and stumbling painfully in the thick ground-debris of
dead branches and soft, treacherous pits of the leaves of many years. They
followed at leisure, aware that he was slowing. The lean, agile tailor had
drawn level with him, somewhat aside, and was bearing round to cut him off,
still with breath enough to whistle to his fellows as they closed unhurriedly,
like dogs herding a stray sheep. Ciaran fell out into a more open glade, where
a huge old beech had preserved its own clearing, and with what was left of his
failing breath he made a last dash to cross the open and vanish again into the
thickets beyond. The dry silt of leaves among the roots betrayed him. His
footing slid from under him, and fetched him down heavily against the bole of
the tree. He had just time to drag himself up and set his back to the broad
trunk before they were on him. He flailed about him with the staff,
screaming for aid, and never even knew on what name he was calling in his
extremity. “Help! Murder! Matthew, Matthew, help me!” There was no answering shout, but there
was an abrupt thrashing of branches, and something hurtled out of cover and
across the grass, so suddenly that Bagot was shouldered aside and stumbled to
his knees. A long arm swept Ciaran back hard against the solid bole of the
tree, and Matthew stood braced beside him, his dagger naked in his hand. What
remained of the western light showed his face roused and formidable, and
gleamed along the blade. “Oh, no!” he challenged loud and clear,
lips drawn back from bared teeth. “Keep your hands off! This man is mine!” Chapter Fourteen THE THREE ATTACKERS had drawn off
instinctively, before they realised that this was but one man erupting in their
midst, but they were quick to grasp it, and had not gone far. They stood, wary
as beasts of prey but undeterred, weaving a little in a slow circle out of
reach, but with no thought of withdrawing. They watched and considered,
weighing up coldly these altered odds. Two men and a knife to reckon with now,
and this second one they knew as well as the first. They had been some days
frequenting the same enclave, using the same dortoir and refectory. They
reasoned without dismay that they must be known as well as they knew their
prey. The twilight made faces shadowy, but a man is recognised by more things
than his face. “I said it, did I not?” said Simeon Poer,
exchanging glances with his henchmen, glances which were understood even in the
dim light. “I said he would not be far. No matter, two can lie as snug as one.” Once having declared his claim and his
rights, Matthew said nothing. The tree against which they braced themselves was
so grown that they could not be attacked from close behind. He circled it
steadily when Bagot edged round to the far side, keeping his face to the enemy.
There were three to watch, and Ciaran was shaken and lame, and in no case to
match any of the three if it came to action, though he kept his side of the
trunk with his staff gripped and ready, and would fight if he must, tooth and
claw, for his forfeit life. Matthew curled his lips in a bitter smile at the
thought that he might be grateful yet for that strong appetite for living. Round the bole of the tree, with his cheek
against the bark, Ciaran said, low-voiced: “You’d have done better not to
follow me.” “Did I not swear to go with you to the
very end?” said Matthew as softly. “I keep my vows. This one above all.” “Yet you could still have crept away
safely. Now we are two dead men.” “Not yet! If you did not want me, why did
you call me?” There was a bewildered silence. Ciaran did
not know he had uttered a name. “We are grown used to each other,” said
Matthew grimly. “You claimed me, as I claim you. Do you think I’ll let any
other man have you?” The three watchers had gathered in a
shadowy group, conferring with heads together, and faces still turned towards
their prey. “Now they’ll come,” said Ciaran in the
dead voice of despair. “No, they’ll wait for darkness.” They were in no hurry. They made no loose,
threatening moves, wasted no breath on words. They bided their time as
patiently as hunting animals. Silently they separated, spacing themselves round
the clearing, and backing just far enough into cover to be barely visible, yet
visible all the same, for their presence and stillness were meant to unnerve.
Just so, motionless, relentless and alert, would a cat sit for hours outside a
mousehole. “This I cannot bear,” said Ciaran in a
faint whisper, and drew sobbing breath. “It is easily cured,” said Matthew through
his teeth. “You have only to lift off that cross from your neck, and you can be
loosed from all your troubles.” The light faded still. Their eyes, raking
the smoky darkness of the bushes, were beginning to see movement where there
was none, and strain in vain after it where it lurked and shifted to baffle
them more. This waiting would not be long. The attackers circled in cover,
watching for the unguarded moment when one or other of their victims would be
caught unawares, staring in the wrong direction. Past all question they would
expect that failure first from Ciaran, half-foundering as he already was. Soon
now, very soon. Brother Cadfael was some half-mile back
along the ride when he heard the cry, ahead and to the right of the path, loud,
wild and desperate. The words were indistinguishable, but the panic in the
sound there was no mistaking. In this woodland silence, without even a wind to
stir the branches or flutter the leaves, every sound carried clearly. Cadfael
spurred ahead in haste, with all too dire a conviction of what he might find when
he reached the source of that lamentable cry. All those miles of pursuit,
patient and remorseless, half the length of England, might well be ending now,
barely a quarter of an hour too soon for him to do anything to prevent. Matthew
had overtaken, surely, a Ciaran grown weary of his penitential austerities, now
there was no one by to see. He had said truly enough that he did not hate
himself so much as to bear his hardships to no purpose. Now that he was alone,
had he felt safe in discarding his heavy cross, and would he next have been in
search of shoes for his feet? If Matthew had not come upon him thus recreant
and disarmed. The second sound to break the stillness
almost passed unnoticed because of the sound of his own progress, but he caught
some quiver of the forest’s unease, and reined in to listen intently. The rush
and crash of something or someone hurtling through thick bushes, fast and
arrow-straight, and then, very briefly, a confusion of cries, not loud but
sharp and wary, and a man’s voice loud and commanding over all. Matthew’s
voice, not in triumph or terror, rather in short and resolute defiance. There
were more than the two of them, there ahead, and not so far ahead now. He dismounted, and led his horse at an
anxious trot as far as he dared along the path; towards the spot from which the
sounds had come. Hugh could move very fast when he saw reason, and in Cadfael’s
bare message he would have found reason enough. He would have left the town by
the most direct way, over the western bridge and so by a good road south-west,
to strike this old path barely two miles back. At this moment he might be
little more than a mile behind. Cadfael tethered his horse at the side of the
track, for a plain sign that he had found cause to halt here and was somewhere
close by. All was quiet about him now. He quested
along the fringe of bushes for a place where he might penetrate without any
betraying noise, and began to work his way by instinct and touch towards the
place whence the cries had come, and where now all was almost unnaturally
silent. In a little while he was aware of the last faint pallor of the
afterglow glimmering between the branches. There was a more open glade ahead of
him. He froze and stood motionless, as a shadow
passed silently between him and this lingering glimpse of light. Someone tall
and lean, slithering snake-like through the bushes. Cadfael waited until the
faint pattern of light was restored, and then edged carefully forward until he
could see into the clearing. The great bole of a beech-tree showed in
the centre, a solid mass beneath its spread of branches. There was movement
there in the dimness. Not one man, but two, stood pressed against the bole. A
brief flash of steel caught just light enough to show what it was, a dagger
naked and ready. Two at bay here, and surely more than one pinning them thus
helpless until they could be safely pulled down. Cadfael stood still to survey
the whole of the darkening clearing, and found, as he had expected, another
quiver of leaves that hid a man, and then, on the opposite side, yet another.
Three, probably all armed, certainly up to no good, thus furtively prowling the
woods by night, going nowhere, waiting to make the kill. Three had vanished
from the dice school under the bridge at Shrewsbury, and fled in this
direction. Three reappeared here in the forest, still doing after their
disreputable kind. Cadfael stood hesitant, pondering how best
to deal, whether to steal back to the path and wait and hope for Hugh’s coming,
or attempt something alone, at least to distract and dismay, to bring about a
delay that might afford time for help to come. He had made up his mind to
return to his horse, mount, and ride in here with as much noise and turmoil as
he could muster, trying to sound like six mounted men instead of one, when with
shattering suddenness the decision was taken out of his hands. One of the three besiegers sprang out of
cover with a startling shout, and rushed at the tree on the side where the
momentary flash of steel had shown one of the victims, at least, to be armed. A
dark figure leaned out from the darkness under the branches to meet the
onslaught, and Cadfael knew him then for Matthew. The attacker swerved aside,
still out of reach, in a calculated feint, and at the same moment both the other
lurking shadows burst out of cover and bore down upon the other side of the
tree, falling as one upon the weaker opponent. There was a confusion of
violence, and a wild, tormented scream, and Matthew whirled about, slashing
round him and stretching a long arm across his companion, pinning him back
against the tree. Ciaran hung half-fainting, slipping down between the great,
smooth bastions of the bole, and Matthew bestrode him, his dagger sweeping
great swathes before them both. Cadfael saw it, and was held mute and
motionless, beholding this devoted enemy. He got his breath only as all three
of the predators closed upon their prey together, slashing, mauling, by sheer
weight bearing them down under them. Cadfael filled his lungs full, and
bellowed to the shaken night: “Hold, there! On them, hold them all three. These
are our felons!” He was making so much noise that he did not notice or marvel
that the echoes, which in his fury he heard but did not heed, came from two
directions at once, from the path he had left, and from the opposite point,
from the north. Some corner of his mind knew he had roused echoes, but for his
part he felt himself quite alone as he kept up his roaring, spread his sleeves
like the wings of a bat, and surged headlong into the melee about the tree. Long, long ago he had forsworn arms, but
what of it? Barring his two stout fists, still active but somewhat rheumatic
now, he was unarmed. He flung himself into the tangle of men and weapons under
the beech, laid hands on the back of a dangling capuchon, hauled its wearer
bodily backwards, and twisted the cloth to choke the throat that howled rage
and venom at him. But his voice had done more than his martial progress. The
black huddle of humanity burst into its separate beings. Two sprang clear and
looked wildly about them for the source of the alarm, and Cadfael’s opponent
reached round, gasping, with a long arm and a vicious dagger, and sliced a
dangling streamer out of a rusty black sleeve. Cadfael lay on him with all his
weight, held him by the hair, and ground his face into the earth, shamelessly
exulting. He would do penance for it some day soon, but now he rejoiced, all
his crusader blood singing in his veins. Distantly he was aware that something else
was happening, more than he had reckoned on. He heard and felt the unmistakable
quiver and thud of the earth reacting to hooves, and heard a peremptory voice
shouting orders, the purport of which he did not release his grip to decypher
or attend to. The glade was filled with motion as it filled with darkness. The
creature under him gathered itself and heaved mightily, rolling him aside. His
hold on the folds of the hood relaxed, and Simeon Poer tore himself free and
scrambled clear. There was running every way, but none of the fugitives got
far. Last of the three to roll breathless out
of hold, Simeon groped about him vengefully in the roots of the tree, touched a
cowering body, found the cord of some dangling relic, possibly precious, in his
hand, and hauled with all his strength before he gathered himself up and ran
for cover. There was a wild scream of pain, and the
cord broke, and the thing, whatever it was, came loose in his hand. He got his
feet under him, and charged head-down for the nearest bushes, hurtled into them
and ran, barely a yard clear of hands that stooped from horseback to claw at
him. Cadfael opened his eyes and hauled in
breath. The whole clearing was boiling with movement, the darkness heaved and
trembled, and the violence had ordered itself into purpose and meaning. He sat
up, and took his time to look about him. He was sprawled under the great beech,
and somewhere before him, towards the path where he had left his horse, someone
with flint and dagger and tinder, was striking sparks for a torch, very calmly.
The sparks caught, glowed, and were gently blown into flame. The torch, well
primed with oil and resin, sucked in the flame and gave birth to a small,
shapely flame of its own, that grew and reared, and was used to kindle a second
and a third. The clearing took on a small, confined, rounded shape, walled with
close growth, roofed with the tree. Hugh came out of the dark, smiling, and
reached a hand to haul him to his feet. Someone else came running light-footed
from the other side, and stooped to him a wonderful, torch-lit face,
high-boned, lean-cheeked, with eager golden eyes, and blue-black raven wings of
hair curving to cup his cheeks. “Olivier?” said Cadfael, marvelling. “I
thought you were astray on the road to Oswestry. How did you ever find us
here?” “By grace of God and a goat-herd,” said
the warm, gay, remembered voice, “and your bull’s bellowing. Come, look round!
You have won your field. They were gone, Simeon Poer, merchant of Guildford,
Walter Bagot, glover, John Shure, tailor, all fled, but with half a dozen of
Hugh’s men hard on their heels, all to be brought in captive, to answer for
more, this time, than a little cheating in the marketplace. Night stooped to
enfold a closed arena of torchlight, very quiet now and almost still. Cadfael
rose, his torn sleeve dangling awkwardly. The three of them stood in a half-circle
about the beech-tree. The torchlight was stark, plucking light
and shadow into sharp relief. Matthew stirred out of his colloquy between life
and death very slowly as they watched him, heaved his wide shoulders clear of
the tree, and stood forth like a sleeper roused before his time, looking about
him as if for something by which he might hold, and take his bearings. Between
his feet, as he emerged, the coiled, crumpled form of Ciaran came into view,
faintly stirring, his head huddled into his close-folded arms. “Get up!” said Matthew. He drew back a
little from the tree, his naked dagger in his hand, a slow drop gathering at
its tip, more drops falling steadily from the hand that held it. His knuckles
were sliced raw. “Get up!” he said. “You are not harmed.” Ciaran gathered himself very slowly, and
clambered to his knees, lifting to the light a face soiled and leaden, gone
beyond exhaustion, beyond fear. He looked neither at Cadfael nor at Hugh, but
stared up into Matthew’s face with the helpless intensity of despair. Hugh felt
the clash of eyes, and stirred to make some decisive movement and break the
tension, but Cadfael laid a hand on his arm and held him still. Hugh gave him a
sharp sidelong glance, and accepted the caution. Cadfael had his reasons. There was blood on the torn collar of
Ciaran’s shirt, a stain that grew sluggishly before their eyes. He put up hands
that seemed heavy as lead, and fumbled aside the linen from throat and breast.
All round the left side of his neck ran a raw, bleeding slash, thin as a
knife-cut. Simeon Poer’s last blind clutch for plunder had torn loose the cross
to which Ciaran had clung so desperately. He kneeled in the last wretched
extreme of submission, baring a throat already symbolically slit. “Here am I,” he said in a toneless
whisper. “I can run no further, I am forfeit. Now take me!” Matthew stood motionless, staring at that
savage cut the cord had left before it broke. The silence grew too heavy to be bearable,
and still he had no word to say, and his face was a blank mask in the
flickering light of the torches. “He says right,” said Cadfael, very softly
and reasonably. “He is yours fairly. The terms of his penance are broken, and
his life is forfeit. Take him!” There was no sign that Matthew so much as
heard him, but for the spasmodic tightening of his lips, as if in pain. He
never took his eyes from the wretch kneeling humbly before him. “You have followed him faithfully, and
kept the terms laid down,” Cadfael urged gently. “You are under vow. Now finish
the work!” He was on safe enough ground, and sure of
it now. The act of submission had already finished the work, there was no more
to be done. With his enemy at his mercy, and every justification for the act of
vengeance, the avenger was helpless, the prisoner of his own nature. There was
nothing left in him but a drear sadness, a sick revulsion of disgust and
self-disgust. How could he kill a wretched, broken man, kneeling here
unresisting, waiting for his death? Death was no longer relevant. “It is over, Luc,” said Cadfael softly.
“Do what you must.” Matthew stood mute a moment longer, and if
he had heard his true name spoken, he gave no sign, it was of no importance.
After the abandonment of all purpose came the awful sense of loss and
emptiness. He opened his bloodstained hand and let the dagger slip from his
fingers into the grass. He turned away like a blind man, feeling with a
stretched foot for every step, groped his way through the curtain of bushes,
and vanished into the darkness. Olivier drew in breath sharply, and
started out of his tranced stillness to catch eagerly at Cadfael’s arm. “Is it
true? You have found him out? He is Luc Meverel?” He accepted the truth of it
without another word said, and sprang ardently towards the place where the
bushes still stirred after Luc’s passing, and he would have been off in pursuit
at a run if Hugh had not caught at his arm to detain him. “Wait but one moment! You also have a
cause here, if Cadfael is right. This is surely the man who murdered your
friend. He owes you a death. He is yours if you want him.” “That is truth,” said Cadfaei. “Ask him!
He will tell you.” Ciaran crouched in the grass, drooping
now, bewildered and lost, no longer looking any man in the face, only waiting
without hope or understanding for someone to determine whether he was to live
or die, and on what abject terms. Olivier cast one wondering glance at him,
shook his head in emphatic rejection, and reached for his horse’s bridle. “Who am
I,” he said, “to exact what Luc Meverel has remitted? Let this one go on his
way with his own burden. My business is with the other.” He was away at a run, leading the horse
briskly through the screen of bushes, and the rustling of their passage gradually
stilled again into silence. Cadfael and Hugh were left regarding each other
mutely across the lamentable figure crouched upon the ground. Gradually the rest of the world flowed
back into Cadfael’s ken. Three of Hugh’s officers stood aloof with the horses
and the torches, looking on in silence; and somewhere not far distant sounded a
brief scuffle and outcry, as one of the fugitives was overpowered and made
prisoner. Simeon Poer had been pulled down barely fifty yards in cover, and
stood sullenly under guard now, with his wrists secured to a sergeant’s
stirrup-leather. The third would not be a free man long. This night’s ventures
were over. This piece of woodland would be safe even for barefoot and unarmed
pilgrims to traverse. “What is to be done with him?” demanded
Hugh openly, looking down upon the wreckage of a man with some distaste. “Since Luc has waived his claim,” said
Cadfael, “I would not dare meddle. And there is something at least to be said
for him, he did not cheat or break his terms voluntarily, even when there was
no one by to accuse him. It is a small virtue to have to advance for the
defence of a life, but it is something. Who else has the right to foreclose on
what Luc has spared?” Ciaran raised his head, peering doubtfully
from one face to the other, still confounded at being so spared, but beginning
to believe that he still lived. He was weeping, whether with pain, or relief,
or something more durable than either, there was no telling. The blood was
blackening into a dark line about his throat. “Speak up and tell truth,” said Hugh with
chill gentleness. “Was it you who stabbed Bossard?” Out of the pallid disintegration of
Ciaran’s face a wavering voice said: “Yes.” “Why did you so? Why attack the queen’s
clerk, who did nothing but deliver his errand faithfully?” Ciaran’s eyes burned for an instant, and a
fleeting spark of past pride, intolerance and rage showed like the last glow of
a dying fire. “He came high-handed, shouting down the lord bishop, defying the
council. My master was angry and affronted…” “Your master,” said Cadfael, “was the
prior of Hyde Mead. Or so you claimed.” “How could I any longer claim service with
one who had discarded me? I lied! The lord bishop himself, I served Bishop
Henry, had his favour. Lost, lost now! I could not brook the man Christian’s
insolence to him… he stood against everything my lord planned and willed. I
hated him! I thought then that I hated him,” said Ciaran, drearily wondering at
the recollection. “And I thought to please my lord!” “A calculation that went awry,” said
Cadfael, “for whatever he may be, Henry of Blois is no murderer. And Rainard
Bossard prevented your mischief, a man of your own party, held in esteem. Did
that make him a traitor in your eyes—that he should respect an honest opponent?
Or did you strike out at random, and kill without intent?” “No,” said the level, lame voice, bereft
of its brief spark. “He thwarted me, I was enraged. I knew
what I did. I was glad… then!” he said, and drew bitter breath. “And who laid upon you this penitential
journey?” asked Cadfael, “and to what end? Your life was granted you, upon
terms. What terms? Someone in the highest authority laid that load upon you.” “My lord the bishop-legate,” said Ciaran,
and wrung wordlessly for a moment at the pain of an old devotion, rejected and
banished now for ever. “There was no other soul knew of it, only to him I told
it. He would not give me up to law, he wanted this thing put by, for fear it
should threaten his plans for the empress’s peace. But he would not condone. I
am from the Danish kingdom of Dublin, my other half Welsh. He offered me
passage under his protection to Bangor, to the bishop there, who would see me
to Caergybi in Anglesey, and have me put aboard a ship for Dublin. But I must
go barefoot all that way, and wear the cross round my neck, and if ever I broke
those terms, even for a moment, my life was his who cared to take it, without
blame or penalty. And I could never return.” Another fire, of banished love,
ruined ambition, rejected service, flamed through the broken accents for a
moment, and died of despair. “Yet if this sentence was never made
public,” said Hugh, seizing upon one thing still unexplained, “how did Luc
Meverel ever come to know of it and follow you?” “Do I know?” The voice was flat and drear,
worn out with exhaustion. “All I know is that I set out from Winchester, and
where the roads joined, near Newbury, this man stood and waited for me, and
fell in beside me, and every step of my way on this journey he has gone on my
heels like a demon, and waited for me to play false to my sentence, for there
was no point of it he did not know!, to take my life without guilt, without a
qualm, as so he might. He trod after me wherever I trod, he never let me from
his sight, he made no secret of his wants, he tempted me to go aside, to put on
shoes, to lay by the cross, and sirs, it was deathly heavy! Matthew, he called
himself… Luc, you say he is? You know him? I never
knew… He said I had killed his lord, whom he loved, and he would follow me to
Bangor, to Caergybi, even to Dublin if ever I got aboard ship without putting
off the cross or putting on shoes. But he would have me in the end. He had what
he lusted for, why did he turn away and spare?” The last words ached with his
uncomprehending wonder. “He did not find you worth the killing,”
said Cadfael, as gently and mercifully as he could, but honestly. “Now he goes
in anguish and shame because he spent so much time on you that might have been
better spent. It is a matter of values. Study to learn what is worth and what
is not, and you may come to understand him.” “I am a dead man while I live,” said
Ciaran, writhing, “without master, without friends, without a cause…” “All three you may find, if you seek. Go
where you were sent, bear what you were condemned to bear, and look for the
meaning,” said Cadfael. “For so must we all.” He turned away with a sigh. No way of
knowing how much good words might do, or the lessons of life, no telling
whether any trace of compunction moved in Ciaran’s bludgeoned mind, or whether
all his feeling was still for himself. Cadfael felt himself suddenly very
tired. He looked at Hugh with a somewhat lopsided smile. “I wish I were home.
What now, Hugh? Can we go?” Hugh stood looking down with a frown at
the confessed murderer, sunken in the grass like a broken-backed serpent,
submissive, tear-stained, nursing minor injuries. A piteous spectacle, though
pity might be misplaced. Yet he was, after all, no more than twenty-five or so
years old, able-bodied, well-clothed, strong, his continued journey might be
painful and arduous, but it was not beyond his powers, and he had his bishop’s
ring still, effective wherever law held. These three footpads now tethered fast
and under guard would trouble his going no more. Ciaran would surely reach his
journey’s end safely, however long it might take him. Not the journey’s end of
his false story, a blessed death in Aberdaron and burial among the saints of
Ynys Ennli, but a return to his native place, and a life beginning afresh. He
might even be changed. He might well adhere to his hard terms all the way to
Caergybi, where Irish ships plied, even as far as Dublin, even to his ransomed
life’s end. How can you tell? “Make your own way from here,” said Hugh,
“as well as you may. You need fear nothing now from footpads here, and the
border is not far. What you have to fear from God, take up with God.” He turned his back, with so decisive a
movement that his men recognised the sign that all was over, and stirred
willingly about the captives and the horses. “And those two?” asked Hugh. “Had I not
better leave a man behind on the track there, with a spare horse for Luc? He
followed his quarry afoot, but no need for him to foot it back. Or ought I to
send men after them?” “No need for that,” said Cadfael with
certainty. “Olivier will manage all. They’ll come home together.” He had no qualms at all, he was beginning
to relax into the warmth of content. The evil he had dreaded had been averted,
however narrowly, at whatever cost. Olivier would find his stray, bear with
him, follow if he tried to avoid, wrung and ravaged as he was, with the sole
obsessive purpose of his life for so long ripped away from him, and within him
only the aching emptiness where that consuming passion had been. Into that
barren void Olivier would win his way, and warm the ravished heart to make it
habitable for another love. There was the most comforting of messages to bring
from Juliana Bossard, the promise regained of a home and a welcome. There was a
future. How had Matthew-Luc seen his future when he emptied his purse of the
last coin at the abbey, before taking up the pursuit of his enemy? Surely he
had been contemplating the end of the person he had hitherto been, a total
ending, beyond which he could not see. Now he was young again, there was a life
before him, it needed only a little time to make him whole again. Olivier would bring him back to the abbey,
when the worst desolation was over. For Olivier had promised that he would not
leave without spending some time leisurely with Cadfael, and upon Olivier’s
promise the heart could rest secure. As for the other… Cadfael looked back from
the saddle, after they had mounted, and saw the last of Ciaran, still on his
knees under the tree, where they had left him. His face was turned to them, but
his eyes seemed to be closed, and his hands were wrung tightly together before
his breast. He might have been praying, he might have been simply experiencing
with every particle of his flesh the life that had been left to him. When we
are all gone, thought Cadfael, he will fall asleep there where he lies, he can
do no other, for he is far gone in something beyond exhaustion. Where he falls
asleep, there he will have died. But when he awakes, I trust he may understand
that he has been born again. The slower cortege that would bring the
prisoners into the town began to assemble, making the tethering thongs secure,
and the torch-bearers crossed the clearing to mount, withdrawing their yellow
light from the kneeling figure, so that Ciaran vanished gradually, as though he
had been absorbed into the bole of the beech-tree. Hugh led the way out to the track, and
turned homeward. “Oh, Hugh, I grow old!” said Cadfael, hugely yawning. “I want
my bed.” Chapter Fifteen IT WAS PAST MIDNIGHT when they rode in at
the gatehouse, into a great court awash with moonlight, and heard the chanting
of Matins within the church. They had made no haste on the way home, and said
very little, content to ride companionably together as sometimes before,
through summer night or winter day. It would be another hour or more yet before
Hugh’s officers got their prisoners back to Shrewsbury Castle, since they must
keep a foot-pace, but before morning Simeon Poer and his henchmen would be safe
in hold, under lock and key. “I’ll wait with you until Lauds is over,”
said Hugh, as they dismounted at the gatehouse. “Father Abbot will want to know
how we’ve sped. Though I hope he won’t require the whole tale from us tonight.” “Come down with me to the stables, then,”
said Cadfael, “and I’ll see this fellow unsaddled and tended, while they’re
still within. I was always taught to care for my beast before seeking my own
rest. You never lose the habit.” In the stable-yard the moonlight was all
the light they needed. The quietness of midnight and the stillness of the air
carried every note of the office to them softly and clearly. Cadfael unsaddled
his horse and saw him settled and provided in his stall, with a light rug
against any possible chill, rites he seldom had occasion to perform now. They
brought back memories of other mounts and other journeys, and battlefields less
happily resolved than the small but desperate skirmish just lost and won. Hugh stood watching with his back turned
to the great court, but his head tilted to follow the chant. Yet it was not any
sound of an approaching step that made him look round sudenly, but the slender
shadow that stole along the moonlit cobbles beside his feet. And there hesitant
in the gateway of the yard stood Melangell, startled and startling, haloed in
that pallid sheen. “Child,” said Cadfael, concerned, “what
are you doing out of your bed at this hour?” “How could I rest?” she said, but not as
one complaining. “No one misses me, they are all sleeping.” She stood very
still and straight, as if she had spent all the hours since he had left her in
earnest endeavour to put away for ever any memories he might have of the
tear-stained, despairing girl who had sought solitude in his workshop. The
great sheaf of her hair was braided and pinned up on her head, her gown was
trim, and her face resolutely calm as she asked, “Did you find him?” A girl he had left her, a woman he came
back to her. “Yes,” said Cadfael, “we found them both. There has nothing ill
happened to either. The two of them have parted. Ciaran goes on his way alone.” “And Matthew?” she asked steadily. “Matthew is with a good friend, and will
come to no harm. We two have outridden them, but they will come.” She would
have to learn to call him by another name now, but let the man himself tell her
that. Nor would the future be altogether easy, for her or for Luc Meverel, two
human creatures who might never have been brought within hail of each other but
for freakish circumstance. Unless Saint Winifred had had a hand in that, too?
On this night Cadfael could believe it, and trust her to bring all to a good
end. “He will come back,” said Cadfael, meeting her candid eyes, that bore no
trace of tears now. “You need not fear. But he has suffered a great turmoil of
the mind, and he’ll need all your patience and wisdom. Ask him nothing. When
the time is right he will tell you everything. Reproach him with nothing.” “God forbid,” she said,”that I should ever
reproach him. It was I who failed him.” “No, how could you know? But when he
comes, wonder at nothing. Be like one who is thirsty and drinks. And so will
he.” She had turned a little towards him, and
the moonlight blanched wonderfully over her face, as if a lamp within her had
been newly lighted. “I will wait,” she said. “Better go to your bed and sleep, the
waiting may be longer than you think, he has been wrung. But he will come.” But at that she shook her head. “I’ll
watch till he comes,” she said, and suddenly smiled at them, pale and lustrous
as pearl, and turned and went away swiftly and silently towards the cloister. “That is the girl you spoke of?” asked
Hugh, looking after her with somewhat frowning interest. “The lame boy’s
sister? The girl that young man fancies?” “That is she,” said Cadfael, and closed
the half-door of the stall. “The weaver-woman’s niece?” “That, too. Dowerless and from common
stock,” said Cadfael, understanding but untroubled. “Yes, true! I’m from common
stock myself. I doubt if a young fellow who has been torn apart and remade as
Luc has tonight will care much about such little things. Though I grant you
others may! I hope the lady Juliana has no plans yet for marrying him off to
some heiress from a neighbour manor, for I fancy things have gone so far now
with these two that she’ll be forced to abandon her plans. A manor or a craft,
if you take pride in them, and run them well, where’s the difference?” “Your common stock,” said Hugh heartily,
“gave growth to a most uncommon shoot! And I wouldn’t say but that young thing
would grace a hall better than many a highbred dame I’ve seen. But listen,
they’re ending. We’d best present ourselves.” Abbot Radulfus came from Matins and Lauds
with his usual imperturbable stride, and found them waiting for him as he left
the cloister. This day of miracles had produced a fittingly glorious night,
incredibly lofty and deep, coruscating with stars, washed white with moonlight.
Coming from the dimness within, this exuberance of light showed him clearly
both the serenity and the weariness on the two faces that confronted him. “You are back!” he said, and looked beyond
them. “But not all! Messire de Bretagne, you said he had gone by a wrong way.
He has not returned here. You have not encountered him?” “Yes, Father, we have,” said Hugh. “All is
well with him, and he has found the young man he was seeking. They will return
here, all in good time.” “And the evil you feared, Brother Cadfael?
You spoke of another death…” “Father,” said Cadfael, “no harm has come
tonight to any but the masterless men who escaped into the forest there. They
are now safe in hold, and on their way under guard to the castle. The death I
dreaded has been averted, no threat remains in that quarter to any man. I said,
if the two young men could be overtaken, the better surely for one, and perhaps
for both. Father, they were overtaken in time, and better for both it surely
must be.” “Yet there remains,” said Radulfus,
pondering, “the print of blood, which both you and I have seen. You said, you
will recall, that, yes, we have entertained a murderer among us. Do you still
say so?” “Yes, Father. Yet not as you suppose. When
Olivier de Bretagne and Luc Meverel return, then all can be made plain, for as
yet,” said Cadfael, “there are still certain things we do not know. But we do
know,” he said firmly, “that what has passed this night is the best for which
we could have prayed, and we have good need to give thanks for it.” “So all is well?” “All is very well, Father.” “Then the rest may wait for morning. You
need rest. But will you not come in with me and take some food and wine, before
you sleep?” “My wife,” said Hugh, gracefully evading,
“will be in some anxiety for me. You are kind, Father, but I would not have her
fret longer than she need.” The abbot eyed them both, and did not
press them. “And God bless you for that!” sighed
Cadfael, toiling up the slight slope of the court towards the dortoir stair and
the gatehouse where Hugh had hitched his horse. “For I’m asleep on my feet, and
even a good wine could not revive me.” The moonlight was gone, and there was as
yet no sunlight, when Olivier de Bretagne and Luc Meverel rode slowly in at the
abbey gatehouse. How far they had wandered in the deep night neither of them
knew very clearly, for this was strange country to both. Even when overtaken,
and addressed with careful gentleness, Luc had still gone forward blindly,
hands hanging slack at his sides or vaguely parting the bushes, saying nothing,
hearing nothing, unless some core of feeling within him was aware of this calm,
relentless pursuit by a tolerant, incurious kindness, and distantly wondered at
it. When he had dropped at last and lain down in the lush grass of a meadow at
the edge of the forest, Olivier had tethered his horse a little apart and lain
down beside him, not too close, yet so close that the mute man knew he was
there, waiting without impatience. Past midnight Luc had fallen asleep. It was
his greatest need. He was a man ravished and emptied of every impulse that had
held him alive for the past two months, a dead man still walking and unable
quite to die. Sleep was his ransom. Then he could truly die to this waste of
loss and bitterness, the awful need that had driven him, the corrosive grief
that had eaten his heart out for his lord, who had died in his arms, on his
shoulder, on his heart. The bloodstain that would not wash out, no matter how
he laboured over it, was his witness. He had kept it to keep the fire of his
hatred white-hot. Now in sleep he was delivered from all. And he had awakened in the first
mysterious pre-dawn stirring of the earliest summer birds, beginning to call
tentatively into the silence, to open his eyes upon a face bending over him, a
face he did not know, but remotely desired to know, for it was vivid, friendly
and calm, waiting courteously on his will. “Did I kill him?” Luc had asked, somehow
aware that the man who bore this face would know the answer. “No,” said a voice clear, serene and low.
“There was no need. But he’s dead to you. You can forget him.” He did not understand that, but he
accepted it. He sat up in the cool, ripe grass, and his senses began to stir
again, and record distantly that the earth smelled sweet, and there were paling
stars in the sky over him, caught like stray sparks in the branches of the
trees. He stared intently into Olivier’s face, and Olivier looked back at him
with a slight, serene smile, and was silent. “Do I know you?” asked Luc wonderingly. “No. But you will. My name is Olivier de
Bretagne, and I serve Laurence d’Angers, just as your lord did. I knew Rainald
Bossard well, he was my friend, we came from the Holy Land together in
Laurence’s train. And I am sent with a message to Luc Meverel, and that, I am
sure, is your name.” “A message to me?” Luc shook his head. “From your cousin and lady, Juliana
Bossard. And the message is that she begs you to come home, for she needs you,
and there is no one who can take your place.” He was slow to believe, still numbed and
hollow within; but there was no impulsion for him to go anywhere or do anything
now of his own will, and he yielded indifferently to Olivier’s promptings. “Now
we should be getting back to the abbey,” said Olivier practically, and rose,
and Luc responded, and rose with him. “You take the horse, and I’ll walk,” said
Olivier, and Luc did as he was bidden. It was like nursing a simpleton gently
along the way he must go, and holding him by the hand at every step. They found their way back at last to the
old track, and there were the two horses Hugh had left behind for them, and the
groom fast asleep in the grass beside them. Olivier took back his own horse,
and Luc mounted the fresh one, with the lightness and ease of custom, his
body’s instincts at least reawakening. The yawning groom led the way, knowing
the path well. Not until they were halfway back towards the Meole brook and the
narrow bridge to the highroad did Luc say a word of his own volition. “You say she wants me to come back,” he
said abruptly, with quickening pain and hope in his voice. “Is it true? I left
her without a word, but what else could I do? What can she think of me now?” “Why, that you had your reasons for
leaving her, as she has hers for wanting you back. Half the length of England I
have been asking after you, at her entreaty. What more do you need?” “I never thought to return,” said Luc,
staring back down that long, long road in wonder and doubt. No, not even to Shrewsbury, much less to
his home in the south. Yet here he was, in the cool, soft morning twilight well
before Prime, riding beside this young stranger over the wooden bridge that
crossed the Meole brook, instead of wading through the shrunken stream to the
pease fields, the way by which he had left the enclave. Round to the highroad,
past the mill and the pond, and in at the gatehouse to the great court. There
they lighted down, and the groom took himself and his two horses briskly away
again towards the town. Luc stood gazing about him dully, still
clouded by the unfamiliarity of everything he beheld, as if his senses were
still dazed and clumsy with the effort of coming back to life. At this hour the
court was empty. No, not quite empty. There was someone sitting on the stone
steps that climbed to the door of the guest-hall, sitting there alone and quite
composedly, with her face turned towards the gate, and as he watched she rose
and came down the wide steps, and walked towards him with a swift, light step.
Then he knew her for Melangell. In her at least there was nothing
unfamiliar. The sight of her brought back colour and form and reality into the
very stones of the wall at her back, and the cobbles under her feet. The
elusive grey between-light could not blur the outlines of head and hand, or dim
the brightness of her hair. Life came flooding back into Luc with a shock of
pain, as feeling returns after a numbing wound. She came towards him with hands
a little extended and face raised, and the faintest and most anxious of smiles
on her lips and in her eyes. Then, as she hesitated for the first time, a few
paces from him, he saw the dark stain of the bruise that marred her cheek. It was the bruise that shattered him. He
shook from head to heels in a great convulsion of shame and grief, and
blundered forward blindly into her arms, which reached gladly to receive him.
On his knees, with his arms wound about her and his face buried in her breast,
he burst into a storm of tears, as spontaneous and as healing as Saint
Winifred’s own miraculous spring. He was in perfect command of voice and
face when they met after chapter in the abbot’s parlour, abbot, prior, Brother
Cadfael, Hugh Beringar, Olivier and Luc, to set right in all its details the account
of Rainald Bossard’s death, and all that had followed from it. “Unwittingly I deceived you, Father,” said
Cadfael, harking back to the interview which had sent him forth in such haste.
“When you asked if we had entertained a murderer unawares, I answered truly
that I did think so, but that we might yet have time to prevent a second death.
I never realised until afterwards how you might interpret that, seeing we had
just found the blood-stained shirt. But, see, the man who struck the blow might
be spattered as to sleeve or collar, but he would not be marked by this great
blot that covered breast and shoulder over the heart. No, that was rather the
sign of one who had held a wounded man, a man wounded to death, in his arms as
he died. Nor would the slayer, if his clothing was blood-stained, have kept and
carried it with him, but burned or buried it, or somehow rid himself of it. But
this shirt, though washed most carefully, still bore the outline of the stain
clear to be seen, and it was carried as a sacred relic is carried, perhaps as a
pledge to exact vengeance. So I knew that this same Luc whom we knew as
Matthew, and in whose scrip the talisman was found, was not the murderer. But
when I recalled all the words I had heard those two young men speak, and all
the evidence of devoted attendance, the one on the other, then suddenly I saw
that pairing in the utterly opposed way, as a pursuit. And I feared it must be
to the death.” The abbot looked at Luc, and asked simply:
“Is that a true reading?” “Father, it is.” Luc set forth with
deliberation the progress of his own obsession, as though he discovered it and
understood it only in speaking. “I was with my lord that night, close to the
Old Minster it was, when four or five set on the clerk, and my lord ran, and we
with him, to beat them off. And then they fled, but one turned back and struck.
I saw it done, and it was done of intent! I had my lord in my arms, he had been
good to me, and I loved him,” said Luc with grimly measured moderation and
burning eyes as he remembered. “He was dead in a mere moment, in the twinkling
of an eye… And I had seen where the murderer fled, into the passage by the
chapter house. I went after him, and I heard their voices in the sacristy,
Bishop Henry had come from the chapter house after the council ended for the
night, and there Ciaran had found him and fell on his knees to him, blurting
out all. I lay in hiding, and heard every word. I think he even hoped for
praise,” said Luc with bitter deliberation. “Is it possible?” wondered Prior Robert,
shocked to the heart. “Bishop Henry could not for one moment connive at or
condone an act so evil.” “No, he did not condone. But neither would
he deliver over one of his own intimate servants as a murderer. To do him
justice,” said Luc, but with plain distaste, “his concern was not to cause
further anger and quarrelling, but to put away and smooth over everything that
threatened the empress’s fortunes and the peace he was trying to make. But
condone murder, no, that he would not. Therefore I overheard the sentence he
laid upon Ciaran, though then I did not know who he was, nor that Ciaran was
his name. He banished him back to his Dublin home, for ever, and condemned him
to go every step of the way to Bangor and to the ship at Caergybi barefoot, and
carrying that heavy cross. And if ever he put on shoes or laid by the cross
from round his neck, then his forfeit life was no longer spared, but might be
taken by whoever willed, without sin or penalty. But see,” said Luc, merciless
in judgement, “how he cheated! For not only did he give his creature the ring
that would ensure him the protection of the church to Bangor, but also, mark,
not one word was ever made public of this guilt or this sentence, so how was
that forfeit life in danger? No one was to know of it but they two, if God had
not prevented and brought there a witness to hear the sentence and take upon
himself the vengeance due.” “As you did,” said the abbot, and his
voice was even and calm, avoiding judgement. “As I did, Father. For as Ciaran swore to
keep the terms laid down on pain of death, so did I swear an oath as solemn to
follow him the length of the land, and if ever he broke his terms for a moment,
to have his life as payment for my lord.” “And how,” asked Radulfus in the same mild
tone, “did you know what man you were thus to hunt to his death? For you say
you did not see his face clearly or know his name then.” “I knew the way he was bound to go, and
the day of his setting out. I waited by the roadside for one walking north, barefoot,
and one not used to going barefoot, but very well shod,” said Luc with a brief,
wry smile. “I saw the cross at his neck. I fell in at his side, and I told him,
not who I was, but what. I took another name, so that no failure nor shame of
mine should ever cast a shadow on my lady or her house. One Evangelist in
exchange for another! Step for step with him I went all this way, here to this
place, and never let him from my sight and reach, night or day, and never let
him forget that I meant to be his death. He could not ask help to rid himself
of me, since I could then as easily strip him of his pilgrim holiness and show
what he really was. And I could not denounce him, partly for fear of Bishop
Henry, partly because neither did I want more feuding between factions, my feud
was between two men!, but chiefly because he was mine, mine, and I would not
let any other vengeance or danger reach him. So we kept together, he trying to
elude me, but he was court-bred and tender and crippled by the miles, and I holding
fast to him, and waiting.” He looked up suddenly and caught the
abbot’s compassionate but calm eyes upon him, and his own eyes were wide, dark
and clear. “It is not beautiful, I know. Neither was murder beautiful. And this
blotch was only mine, my lord went to his grave immaculate, defending one
opposed to him.” It was Olivier, silent until now, who said
softly: “And so did you!” The grave, thought Cadfael at the height of the Mass,
had closed firmly to deny Luc entrance, but that arm outstretched between his
enemy and the knives of three assailants must never be forgotten. Hell had also
shut its mouth and refused to devour him. He was young, clean, alive again
after a kind of death. Yes, Olivier had uttered truth. His own life ventured,
his enemy’s life defended, what was there between Luc and his lord but the
accident, the vain and random accident, of the death itself? He recalled also, when he was most
diligent in prayer, that these few days while Saint Winifred was manifesting
her virtue in disentangling the troubled lives of some half-dozen people in
Shrewsbury, were also the vital days when the fates of Englishmen in general
were being determined, perhaps with less compassion and wisdom. For by this
time the date of the empress’s coronation might well be settled, the crown even
now placed upon her head. No doubt God and the saints had that consideration in
mind, too. Matthew-Luc came once again to ask
audience of the abbot, a little before Vespers. Radulfus had him admitted
without question, and sat with him alone, divining his present need. “Father, will you hear me my confession?
For I need absolution from the vow I could not keep. And I do earnestly desire
to be clean of the past before I undertake the future.” “It is a right and a wise desire,” said
Radulfus. “One thing tell me, are you asking absolution for failing to fulfil
the oath you swore?” Luc, already on his knees, raised his head
for a moment from the abbot’s knee, and showed a face open and clear. “No,
Father, but for ever swearing such an oath. Even grief has its arrogance.” “Then you have learned, my son, that
vengeance belongs only to God?” “More than that, Father,” said Luc. “I
have learned that in God’s hands vengeance is safe. However long delayed,
however strangely manifested, the reckoning is sure.” When it was done, when he had raked out of
his heart, with measured voice and long pauses for thought, every drifted grain
of rancour and bitterness and impatience that fretted him, and received
absolution, he rose with a great sigh, and raised a bright and resolute face. “Now, Father, if I may pray of you one
more grace, let me have one of your priests to join me to a wife before I go
from here. Here, where I am made clean and new, I would have love and life
begin together.” Chapter Sixteen ON THE NEXT MORNING, which was the
twenty-fourth day of June, the general bustle of departure began. There was
packing of belongings, buying and parcelling of food and drink for the journey,
and much leave-taking from friends newly made, and arranging of company for the
road. No doubt the saint would have due regard for her own reputation, and keep
the June sun shining until all her devotees were safely home, and with a
wonderful tale to tell. Most of them knew only half the wonder, but even that was
wonder enough. Among the early departures went Brother
Adam of Reading, in no great hurry along the way, for today he would go no
farther than Reading’s daughter-house of Leominster, where there would be
letters waiting for him to carry home to his abbot. He set out with a pouch
well filled with seeds of species his garden did not yet possess, and a
scholarly mind still pondering the miraculous healing he had witnessed from
every theological angle, in order to be able to expound its full significance
when he reached his own monastery. It had been a most instructive and
enlightening festival. “I’d meant to start for home today, too,”
said Mistress Weaver to her cronies Mistress Glover and the apothecary’s widow,
with whom she had formed a strong matronly alliance during these memorable
days, “but now there’s such work doing, I hardly know whether I’m waking or
sleeping, and I must stay over yet a night or two. Who’d ever have thought what
would come of it, when I told my lad we ought to come and make our prayers here
to the good saint, and have faith that she’d be listening? Now it seems I’m to
lose the both of them, my poor sister’s chicks; for Rhun, God bless him, is set
on staying here and taking the cowl, for he says he won’t ever leave the
blessed girl who healed him. And truly I don’t wonder at it, and won’t stand in
his way, for he’s too good for this wicked world outside, so he is! And now
comes young Matthew, no, but it seems we must call him Luc, now, and he’s
well-born, if from a poor landless branch, and will come in for a manor or two
in time, by his good kinswoman’s taking him in…” “Well, and so did you take the boy and
girl in,” pointed out the apothecary’s widow warmly, “and gave them a roof and
a living. There’s good sound justice there.” “Well, so Matthew, I mean Luc, he comes to
me and asks for my girl for his wife, last night it was, and when I answered
honestly, for honest I am and always will be, that my Melangell has but a
meagre dowry, though the best I can give her I will, what says he? That as at
this moment he himself has not one penny to his name in this world, but must go
debtor to the young lord’s charity that came to find him, and as for the
future, if fortune favours him he’ll be thankful, and if not, he has hands and
a will, and can make a way for two to live. Provided the other is my girl, he
says, for there’s none other for him. So what can I say but God bless them
both, and stay to see them wedded?” “It’s a woman’s duty,” said Mistress
Glover heartily, “to make sure all’s done properly, when she hands over a young
girl to a husband. But sure, you’ll miss the two of them.” “So I will,” agreed Dame Alice, shedding a
few tears rather of pride and joy than of grief, at the advancement to
semi-sainthood and promising matrimony of the charges who had cost her dear
enough, and could now be blessed and sped on their respective and respectable
ways with a quiet mind. “So I will! But to see them both set up where they
would be… And good children both, that will take pains for me when I come to
need, as I have for them.” “And they’re to marry here, tomorrow?”
asked the apothecary’s widow, visibly considering putting off her own departure
for another day. “They are indeed, before Mass in the
morning. So it seems I’ll have none to take home but my sole self,” said Dame
Alice, dropping another proud tear or two, and wearing her reflected glory with
admirable grace, “when I take to the road again. But the day after tomorrow
there’s a sturdy company leaving southward, and with them I’ll go.” “And duty well done, my dear soul,” said
Mistress Glover, embracing her friend in a massive arm, “duty very well done!” They were married in the privacy of the
Lady Chapel, by Brother Paul, who was not only master of the novices, but the
chief of their confessors, too, and already had Rhun under his care and
instruction, and felt a fatherly interest in him, which the boy’s affection
very readily extended to embrace the sister. No one else was present but the
family and their witnesses, and the bridal pair wore no festal garments, for
they had none. Luc was in the serviceable brown cotte and hose he had slept in,
out in the fields, and the same crumpled shirt, though newly washed and
smoothed. Melangell was neat and modest in her homespun, proudly balancing her
coronal of braided, deep-gold hair. They were pale as lilies, bright as stars,
and solemn as the grave. After high and moving events, daily life
must still go on. Cadfael went to his work that afternoon well content. With
the meadow grasses in ripe seed and the harvest imminent he had preparations to
make for two seasonal ailments which could be relied upon to recur every year.
There were some who suffered with eruptions on their hands when working in the
harvest, and others who took to sneezing and wheezing, with running eyes, and
needed lotions to help them. He was busy bruising fresh leaves of dock
and mandrake in a mortar for a soothing ointment, when he heard light,
long-striding steps approaching along the gravel of the path, and then half of
the sunlight from the wide-open door was cut off, as someone hesitated in the
doorway. He turned with the mortar hugged to his chest, and the green-stained
wooden pestle arrested in his hand, and there stood Olivier, dipping his tall
head to evade the hanging bunches of herbs, and asking, in the mellow,
confident voice of one assured of the answer, “May I come in?” He was in already, smiling, staring about
him with a boy’s candid curiosity, for he had never been here before. “I’ve
been a truant, I know, but with two days to wait before Luc’s marriage I
thought best to get on with my errand to the sheriff of Stafford, being so
close, and then come back here. I was back, as I said I’d be, in time to see
them wedded. I thought you would have been there.” “So I would, but I was called out to Saint
Giles. Some poor soul of a beggar stumbled in there overnight covered with
sores, they were afraid of a contagion, but it’s no such matter. If he’d had
treatment earlier it would have been an easy matter to cure him, but a week or
so resting in the hospital will do him no harm. Our pair of youngsters here had
no need of me. I’m a part of what’s over and done with for them, you’re a part
of what’s beginning.” “Melangell told me where I should find
you, however, you were missed. And here I am.” “And as welcome as the day,” said Cadfael,
laying his mortar aside. Long, shapely hands gripped both his hands heartily,
and Olivier stooped his olive cheek for the greeting kiss, as simply as for the
parting kiss when they had separated at Bromfield. “Come, sit, let me offer you
wine, my own making. You knew, then, that those two would marry?” “I saw them meet, when I brought him back
here. Small doubt how it would end. Afterwards he told me his intent. When two are agreed, and know their own
minds,” said Olivier blithely, “everything else will give way. I shall see them
both properly provided for the journey home, since I must go by a more
roundabout way.” When two are agreed, and know their own
minds! Cadfael remembered confidences now a year and a half past. He poured
wine carefully, his hand being a shade less steady than usual, and sat down
beside his visitor, the young, wide shoulder firm and vital against his elderly
and stiff one, the clear, elegant profile close, and a pleasure to his eyes.
“Tell me,” he said, “about Ermina,” and was sure of the answer even before
Olivier turned on him his sudden blinding smile. “If I had known my travels would bring me
to you, I should have had so many messages to bring you, from both of them.
From Yves, and from my wife!” “Aaaah!” breathed Cadfael, on a deep,
delighted sigh. “So, as I thought, as I hoped! You have made good, then, what
you told me, that they would acknowledge your worth and give her to you.” Two,
there, who had indeed known their own minds, and been invincibly agreed! “When
was this match made?” “This Christmas past, in Gloucester. She
is there now, so is the boy. He is Laurence’s heir, just fifteen now. He wanted
to come to Winchester with us, but Laurence wouldn’t let him be put in peril.
They are safe, I thank God. If ever this chaos is ended,” said Olivier very
solemnly, “I will bring her to you, or you to her. She does not forget you.” “Nor I her, nor I her! Nor the boy. He
rode with me twice, asleep in my arms, I still recall the warmth and the shape
and the weight of him. A good boy as ever stepped!” “He’d be a load for you now,” said
Olivier, laughing. This year past, he’s shot up like a weed, he’ll be taller
than you.” “Ah, well, I’m beginning to shrink like a
spent weed. And you are happy?” asked Cadfael, thirsting for more blessedness
even than he already had. “You and she both?” “Beyond what I know how to express,” said
Olivier no less gravely. “How glad I am to have seen you again, and been able
to tell you so! Do you remember the last time? When I waited with you in
Bromfield to take Ermina and Yves home? And you drew me maps on the floor to
show me the ways?” There is a point at which joy is only just
bearable. Cadfael got up to refill the wine-cups, and turn his face away for a moment
from a brightness almost too bright. “Ah, now, if this is to be a contest in
“do-you-remembers” we shall be at it until Vespers, for not one detail of that
time have I forgotten. So let’s have this flask here within reach, and settle
down to it in comfort.” But there was an hour and more left before
Vespers when Hugh put an abrupt end to remembering. He came in haste, with a
face blazingly alert, and full of news. Even so he was slow to speak, not
wishing to exult openly in what must be only shock and dismay to Olivier. “There’s news. A courier rode in from
Warwick just now, they’re passing the word north by stages as fast as horse can
go.” They were both on their feet by then, intent upon his face, and waiting
for good or evil, for he contained it well. A good face for keeping secrets,
and under strong control now out of courteous consideration. “I fear,” he said,
“it will not come as gratefully to you, Olivier, as I own it does to me.” “From the south…” said Olivier, braced and
still. “From London? The empress?” “Yes, from London. All is overturned in a
day. There’ll be no coronation. Yesterday as they sat at dinner in Westminster,
the Londoners suddenly rang the tocsin, all the city bells. The entire town
came out in arms, and marched on Westminster. They’re fled, Olivier, she and
all her court, fled in the clothes they wore and with very little else, and the
city men have plundered the palace and driven out even the last hangers-on. She
never made move to win them, nothing but threats and reproaches and demands for
money ever since she entered. She’s let the crown slip through her fingers for
want of a few soft words and a queen’s courtesy. For your part,” said Hugh,
with real compunction, “I’m sorry! For mine, I find it a great deliverance.” “With that I find no fault,” said Olivier
simply. “Why should you not be glad? But she… she’s safe? They have not taken
her?” “No, according to the messenger she’s
safely away, with Robert of Gloucester and a few others as loyal, but the rest,
it seems, scattered and made off for their own lands, where they’d feel safe.
That’s the word as he brought it, barely a day old. The city of London was
being pressed hard from the south,” said Hugh, somewhat softening the load of
folly that lay upon the empress’s own shoulders, “with King Stephen’s queen
harrying their borders. To get relief their only way was to drive the empress
out and let the queen in, and their hearts were on her side, no question, of
the two they’d liefer have her.” “I knew,” said Olivier,”she was not wise,
the Empress Maud. I knew she could not forget grudges, no matter how sorely she
needed to close her eyes to them. I have seen her strip a man’s dignity from
him when he came submissive, offering support… Better at making enemies than
friends. All the more she needs,” he said, “the few she has. Where is she gone?
Did your messenger know?” “Westward for Oxford. And they’ll reach it
safely. The Londoners won’t follow so far, their part was only to drive her
out.” “And the bishop? Is he gone with her?” The
entire enterprise had rested upon the efforts of Henry of Blois, and he had
done his best for her, not entirely creditably but understandably and at
considerable cost, and his best she herself had undone. Stephen was a prisoner
in Bristol, but Stephen was still crowned and anointed king of England. No
wonder Hugh’s eyes shone. “Of the bishop I know nothing as yet. But
he’ll surely join her in Oxford. Unless…” “Unless he changes sides again,” Olivier
ended for him, and laughed. “It seems I shall have to leave you in more haste
than I expected,” he said with regret. “One fortune rises, another falls. No
sense in quarrelling with the lot.” “What will you do?” asked Hugh, watching
him steadily. “You know, I think, that whatever you may ask of us here, is
yours, and the choice is yours. Your horses are fresh. Your men will not yet
have heard the news, they’ll be waiting on your word. If you need stores for a
journey, take whatever you will. Or if you choose to stay…” Olivier shook his blue-black head, and the
clasping curves of glossy hair danced on his cheeks. “I must go. Not north,
where I was sent. What use in that, now? South for Oxford. Whatever she may be
else, she is my liege lord’s liege lady, where she is he will be, and where he
is, I go.” They eyed each other silently for a
moment, and Hugh said softly, quoting remembered words: “To tell you truth, now
I’ve met you I expected nothing less.” “I’ll go and rouse my men, and we’ll get
to horse. You’ll follow to your house, before I go? I must take leave of Lady
Beringar.” “I’ll follow you,” said Hugh. Olivier turned to Brother Cadfael without
a word but with the brief golden flash of a smile breaking through his roused
gravity for an instant, and again vanishing. “Brother… remember me in your
prayers!” He stooped his smooth cheek yet again in farewell, and as the elder’s
kiss was given he embraced Cadfael vehemently, with impulsive grace. “Until a
better time!” “God go with you!” said Cadfael. And he was gone, striding rapidly along
the gravel path, breaking into a light run, in no way disheartened or down, a
match for disaster or for triumph. At the corner of the box hedge he turned in
flight to look back, and waved a hand before he vanished. “I wish to God,” said Hugh, gazing after
him, “he was of our party! There’s an odd thing, Cadfael! Will you believe,
just then, when he looked round, I thought I saw something of you about him.
The set of the head, something…” Cadfael, too, was gazing out from the open
doorway to where the last sheen of blue had flashed from the burnished hair,
and the last echo of the light foot on the gravel died into silence. “Oh, no,”
he said absently, “he is altogether the image of his mother.” An unguarded utterance. Unguarded from
absence of mind, or design? The following silence did not trouble him,
he continued to gaze, shaking his head gently over the lingering vision, which
would stay with him through all his remaining years, and might even, by the
grace of God and the saints, be made flesh for him yet a third time. Far beyond
his deserts, but miracles are neither weighed nor measured, but as uncalculated
as the lightnings. “I recall,” said Hugh with careful
deliberation, perceiving that he was permitted to speculate, and had heard only
what he was meant to hear, “I do recall that he spoke of one for whose sake he
held the Benedictine order in reverence… one who had used him like a son…” Cadfael stirred, and looked round at him, smiling as
he met his friend’s fixed and thoughtful eyes. “I always meant to tell you,
some day,” he said tranquilly, “what he does not know, and never will from me.
He is my son.” About
the Author ELLIS PETERS is
the nom-de-crime of English novelist Edith Pargeter, author of scores of
books under her own name. She is the recipient of the Silver Dagger Award,
conferred by the Crime Writers Association in Britain, as well as the coveted
Edgar, awarded by the Mystery Writers of America. Miss Pargeter is also well
known as a translator of poetry and prose from the Czech and has been awarded
the Gold Medal and Ribbon of the Czechoslovak Society for Foreign Relations for
her services to Czech literature. She passed away in 1995, at the age of 82, at
home in her beloved Shropshire. The Pilgrim of Hate In the year of our Lord 1141, civil war over England’s throne
leaves a legacy of violence—and the murder of a knight dear to Brother Cadfael.
And with gentle bud-strewn May, a flood of pilgrims comes to the celebration of
Saint Winifred at the Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, carrying with it
many strange souls and perhaps the knight’s killer. Brother Cadfael’s shrewd
eyes see all: the prosperous merchant who rings false, an angelic lame boy, his
beautiful dowerless sister, and two wealthy penitents. In the name of justice
Cadfael decides to uncover the strange and twisted tale that accompanies these
travelers. Instead he unearths a quest for vengeance, witnesses a miracle, and
finds himself on a razor’s edge between death or the absolution of love. The Tenth Chronicle of Brother Cadfael,
of the Benedictine Abbey of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, at Shrewsbury By Ellis PetersChapter One THEY WERE TOGETHER in Brother Cadfael’s
hut in the herbarium, in the afternoon of the twenty-fifth day of May, and the
talk was of high matters of state, of kings and empresses, and the unbalanced
fortunes that plagued the irreconcilable contenders for thrones. “Well, the lady is not crowned yet!” said
Hugh Beringar, almost as firmly as if he saw a way of preventing it. “She is not even in London yet,” agreed
Cadfael, stirring carefully round the pot embedded in the coals of his brazier,
to keep the brew from boiling up against the sides and burning. “She cannot
well be crowned until they let her in to Westminster. Which it seems, from all
I gather, they are in no hurry to do.” “Where the sun shines,” said Hugh
ruefully, “there whoever’s felt the cold will gather. My cause, old friend, is
out of the sun. When Henry of Blois shifts, all men shift with him, like
starvelings huddled in one bed. He heaves the coverlet, and they go with him,
clinging by the hems.” “Not all,” objected Cadfael, briefly
smiling as he stirred. “Not you. Do you think you are the only one?” “God forbid!” said Hugh, and suddenly
laughed, shaking off his gloom. He came back from the open doorway, where the
pure light spread a soft golden sheen over the bushes and beds of the
herb-garden and the moist noon air drew up a heady languor of spiced and
drunken odours, and plumped his slender person down again on the bench against
the timber wall, spreading his booted feet on the earth floor. A small man in
one sense only, and even so trimly made. His modest stature and light weight
had deceived many a man to his undoing. The sunshine from without, fretted by
the breeze that swayed the bushes, was reflected from one of Cadfael’s great
glass flagons to illuminate by flashing glimpses a lean, tanned face, clean
shaven, with a quirky mouth, and agile black eyebrows that could twist upward
sceptically into cropped black hair. A face at once eloquent and inscrutable.
Brother Cadfael was one of the few who knew how to read it. Doubtful if even
Hugh’s wife Aline understood him better. Cadfael was in his sixty-second year,
and Hugh still a year or two short of thirty but, meeting thus in easy
companionship in Cadfael’s workshop among the herbs, they felt themselves
contemporaries. “No,” said Hugh, eyeing circumstances
narrowly, and taking some cautious comfort, “not all. There are a few of us
yet, and not so badly placed to hold on to what we have. There’s the queen in
Kent with her army. Robert of Gloucester is not going to turn his back to come
hunting us here while she hangs on the southern fringes of London. And with the
Welsh of Gwynedd keeping our backs against the earl of Chester, we can hold
this shire for King Stephen and wait out the time. Luck that turned once can
turn again. And the empress is not queen of England yet.” But for all that, thought Cadfael, mutely
stirring his brew for Brother Aylwin’s scouring calves, it began to look as
though she very soon would be. Three years of civil war between cousins
fighting for the sovereignty of England had done nothing to reconcile the
factions, but much to sicken the general populace with insecurity, rapine and
killing. The craftsman in the town, the cottar in the village, the serf on the
demesne, would be only too glad of any monarch who could guarantee him a quiet
and orderly country in which to carry on his modest business. But to a man like
Hugh it was no such indifferent matter. He was King Stephen’s liege man, and
now King Stephen’s sheriff of Shropshire, sworn to hold the shire for his
cause. And his king was a prisoner in Bristol castle since the lost battle of
Lincoln. A single February day of this year had seen a total reversal of the
fortunes of the two claimants to the throne. The Empress Maud was up in the
clouds, and Stephen, crowned and anointed though he might be, was down in the
midden, close-bound and close-guarded, and his brother Henry of Blois, bishop
of Winchester and papal legate, far the most influential of the magnates and
hitherto his brother’s supporter, had found himself in a dilemma. He could
either be a hero, and adhere loudly and firmly to his allegiance, thus
incurring the formidable animosity of a lady who was in the ascendant and could
be dangerous, or trim his sails and accommodate himself to the reverses of
fortune by coming over to her side. Discreetly, of course, and with
well-prepared arguments to render his about-face respectable. It was just
possible, thought Cadfael, willing to do justice even to bishops, that Henry
also had the cause of order and peace genuinely at heart, and was willing to
back whichever contender could restore them. “What frets me,” said Hugh restlessly, “is
that I can get no reliable news. Rumours enough and more than enough, every new
one laying the last one dead, but nothing a man can grasp and put his trust in.
I shall be main glad when Abbot Radulfus comes home.” “So will every brother in this house,”
agreed Cadfael fervently. “Barring Jerome, perhaps, he’s in high feather when
Prior Robert is left in charge, and a fine time he’s had of it all these weeks
since the abbot was summoned to Winchester. But Robert’s rule is less favoured
by the rest of us, I can tell you.” “How long is it he’s been away now?”
pondered Hugh. “Seven or eight weeks! The legate’s keeping his court well
stocked with mitres all this time. Maintaining his own state no doubt gives him
some aid in confronting hers. Not a man to let his dignity bow to princes,
Henry, and he needs all the weight he can get at his back.” “He’s letting some of his cloth disperse
now, however,” said Cadfael. “By that token, he may have got a kind of
settlement. Or he may be deceived into thinking he has. Father Abbot sent word
from Reading. In a week he should be here. You’ll hardly find a better
witness.” Bishop Henry had taken good care to keep
the direction of events in his own hands. Calling all the prelates and mitred
abbots to Winchester early in April, and firmly declaring the gathering a
legatine council, no mere church assembly, had ensured his supremacy at the
subsequent discussions, giving him precedence over Archbishop Theobald of
Canterbury, who in purely English church matters was his superior. Just as
well, perhaps. Cadfael doubted if Theobald had greatly minded being outflanked.
In the circumstances a quiet, timorous man might be only too glad to lurk
peaceably in the shadows, and let the legate bear the heat of the sun. “I know it. Once let me hear his account
of what’s gone forward, down there in the south, and I can make my own
dispositions. We’re remote enough here, and the queen, God keep her, has
gathered a very fair array, now she has the Flemings who escaped from Lincoln
to add to her force. She’ll move heaven and earth to get Stephen out of hold,
by whatever means, fair or foul. She is,” said Hugh with conviction, “a better
soldier than her lord. Not a better fighter in the field, God knows you’d need
to search Europe through to find such a one, I saw him at Lincoln, a marvel!
But a better general, that she is. She holds to her purpose, where he tires and
goes off after another quarry. They tell me, and I believe it, she’s drawing
her cordon closer and closer to London, south of the river. The nearer her
rival comes to Westminster, the tighter that noose will be drawn.” “And is it certain the Londoners have
agreed to let the empress in? We hear they came late to the council, and made a
faint plea for Stephen before they let themselves be tamed. It takes a very
stout heart, I suppose, to stand up to Henry of Winchester face to face, and
deny him,” allowed Cadfael, sighing. “They’ve agreed to admit her, which is as
good as acknowledging her. But they’re arguing terms for her entry, as I heard
it, and every delay is worth gold to me and to Stephen. If only,” said Hugh,
the dancing light suddenly sharpening every line of his intent and eloquent
face, “if only I could get a good man into Bristol! There are ways into
castles, even into the dungeons. Two or three good, secret men might do it. A
fistful of gold to a malcontent gaoler… Kings have been fetched off before now,
even out of chains, and he’s not chained. She has not gone so far, not yet.
Cadfael, I dream! My work is here, and I am but barely equal to it. I have no
means of carrying off Bristol, too.” “Once loosed,” said Cadfael, “your king is
going to need this shire ready to his hand.” He turned from the brazier, hoisting aside
the pot and laying it to cool on a slab of stone he kept for the purpose. His
back creaked a little as he straightened it. In small ways he was feeling his
years, but once erect he was spry enough. “I’m done here for this while,” he said,
brushing his hands together to get rid of the hollow worn by the ladle. “Come
into the daylight, and see the flowers we’re bringing on for the festival of
Saint Winifred. Father Abbot will be home in good time to preside over her
reception from Saint Giles. And we shall have a houseful of pilgrims to care
for.” They had brought the reliquary of the
Welsh saint four years previously from Gwytherin, where she lay buried, and
installed it on the altar of the church at the hospital of Saint Giles, at the
very edge of Shrewsbury’s Foregate suburb, where the sick, the infected, the
deformed, the lepers, who might not venture within the walls, were housed and
cared for. And thence they had borne her casket in splendour to her altar in
the abbey church, to be an ornament and a wonder, a means of healing and blessing
to all who came reverently and in need. This year they had undertaken to repeat
that last journey, to bring her from Saint Giles in procession, and open her
altar to all who came with prayers and offerings. Every year she had drawn many
pilgrims. This year they would be legion. “A man might wonder,” said Hugh, standing
spread-footed among the flower beds just beginning to burn from the soft, shy
colours of spring into the blaze of summer, “whether you were not rather
preparing for a bridal.” Hedges of hazel and may-blossom shed
silver petals and dangled pale, silver-green catkins round the enclosure where
they stood, cowslips were rearing in the grass of the meadow beyond, and irises
were in tight, thrusting bud. Even the roses showed a harvest of buds, erect
and ready to break and display the first colour. In the walled shelter of
Cadfael’s herb-garden there were fat globes of peonies, too, just cracking
their green sheaths. Cadfael had medicinal uses for the seeds, and Brother
Petrus, the abbot’s cook, used them as spices in the kitchen. “A man might not be so far out, at that,”
said Cadfael, viewing the fruits of his labours complacently. “A perpetual and
pure bridal. This Welsh girl was virgin until the day of her death.” “And you have married her off since?” It was idly said, in revulsion from
pondering matters of state. In such a garden a man could believe in peace,
fruitfullness and amity. But it encountered suddenly so profound and pregnant a
silence that Hugh pricked up his ears, and turned his head almost stealthily to
study his friend, even before the unguarded answer came. Unguarded either from
absence of mind, or of design, there was no telling. “Not wedded,” said Cadfael, “but certainly
bedded. With a good man, too, and her honest champion. He deserved his reward.” Hugh raised quizzical brows, and cast a
glance over his shoulder towards the long roof of the great abbey church, where
reputedly the lady in question slept in a sealed reliquary on her own altar. An
elegant coffin just long enough to contain a small and holy Welshwoman, with
the neat, compact bones of her race. “Hardly room within there for two,” he
said mildly. “Not two of our gross make, no, not there.
There was space enough where we put them.” He knew he was listened to, now, and
heard with sharp intelligence, if not yet understood. “Are you telling me,” wondered Hugh no
less mildly, “that she is not there in that elaborate shrine of yours, where
everyone else knows she is?” “Can I tell? Many a time I’ve wished it
could be possible to be in two places at once. A thing too hard for me, but for
a saint, perhaps, possible? Three nights and three days she was in there, that
I do know. She may well have left a morsel of her holiness within, if only by
way of thanks to us who took her out again, and put her back where I still, and
always shall, believe she wished to be. But for all that,” owned Cadfael,
shaking his head, “there’s a trailing fringe of doubt that nags at me. How if I
read her wrong?” “Then your only resort is confession and penance,”
said Hugh lightly. “Not until Brother Mark is full-fledged a
priest!” Young Mark was gone from his mother-house and from his flock at Saint
Giles, gone to the household of the bishop of Lichfield, with Leoric Aspley’s
endowment to see him through his studies, and the goal of all his longings
shining distant and clear before him, the priesthood for which God had designed
him. “I’m saving for him,” said Cadfael, “all those sins I feel, perhaps
mistakenly, to be no sins. He was my right hand and a piece of my heart for
three years, and knows me better than any man living. Barring, it may be,
yourself?” he added, and slanted a guileless glance at his friend. “He will
know the truth of me, and by his judgement and for his absolution I’ll embrace
any penance. You might deliver the judgement, Hugh, but you cannot deliver the
absolution.” “Nor the penance, neither,” said Hugh, and
laughed freely. “So tell it to me, and go free without penalty.” The idea of confiding was unexpectedly
pleasing and acceptable. “It’s a long story,” said Cadfeel warningly. “Then now’s your time, for whatever I can
do here is done, nothing is asked of me but watchfulness and patience, and why
should I wait unentertained if there’s a good story to be heard? And you are at
leisure until Vespers. You may even get merit,” said Hugh, composing his face
into priestly solemnity, “by unburdening your soul to the secular arm. And I
can be secret,” he said, “as any confessional.” “Wait, then,” said Cadfael, “while I fetch
a draught of that maturing wine, and come within to the bench under the north
wall, where the afternoon sun falls. We may as well be at ease while I talk.” “It was a year or so before I knew you,”
said Cadfael, bracing his back comfortably against the warmed, stony roughness
of the herb-garden wall. “We were without a tame saint to our house, and
somewhat envious of Wenlock, where the Cluny community had discovered their
Saxon foundress Milburga, and were making great play with her. And we had
certain signs that sent off an ailing brother of ours into Wales, to bathe at
Holywell, where this girl Winifred died her first death, and brought forth her
healing spring. There was her own patron, Saint Beuno, ready and able to bring
her back to life, but the spring remained, and did wonders. So it came to Prior
Robert that the lady could be persuaded to leave Gwytherin, where she died her
second death and was buried, and come and bring her glory to us here in
Shrewsbury. I was one of the party he took with him to deal with the parish there,
and bring them to give up the saint’s bones.” “All of which,” said Hugh, warmed and
attentive beside him, “I know very well, since all men here know it.” “Surely! But you do not know to the end
what followed. There was one Welsh lord in Gwytherin who would not suffer the
girl to be disturbed, and would not be persuaded or bribed or threatened into
letting her go. And he died, Hugh, murdered. By one of us, a brother who came
from high rank, and had his eyes already set on a mitre. And when we came near
to accusing him, it was his life or a better. There were certain young people
of that place put in peril by him, the dead lord’s daughter and her lover. The
boy lashed out in anger, with good reason, seeing his girl wounded and
bleeding. He was stronger than he knew. The murderer’s neck was broken.” “How many knew of this?” asked Hugh, his
eyes narrowed thoughtfully upon the glossy-leaved rose-bushes. “When it befell, only the lovers, the dead
man and I. And Saint Winifred, who had been raised from her grave and laid in
that casket of which you and all men know. She knew. She was there. From the
moment I raised her,” said Cadfael, “and by God, it was I who took her from the
soil, and I who restored her—and still that makes me glad—from the moment I
uncovered those slender bones, I felt in mine they wished only to be left in
peace. It was so little and so wild and quiet a graveyard there, with the small
church long out of use, meadow flowers growing over all, and the mounds so
modest and green. And Welsh soil! The girl was Welsh, like me, her church was
of the old persuasion, what did she know of this alien English shire? And I had
those young things to keep. Who would have taken their word or mine against all
the force of the church? They would have closed their ranks to bury the
scandal, and bury the boy with it, and he guilty of nothing but defending his
dear. So I took measures.” Hugh’s mobile lips twitched. “Now indeed
you amaze me! And what measures were those? With a dead brother to account for,
and Prior Robert to keep sweet…” “Ah, well, Robert is a simpler soul than
he supposes, and then I had a good deal of help from the dead brother himself.
He’d been busy building himself such a reputation for sanctity, delivering
messages from the saint herself—it was he told us she was offering the grave
she’d left to the murdered man—and going into trance-sleeps, and praying to
leave this world and be taken into bliss living… So we did him that small
favour. He’d been keeping a solitary night-watch in the old church, and in the
morning when it ended, there were his habit and sandals fallen together at his
prayer-stool, and the body of him lifted clean out of them, in sweet odours and
a shower of may-blossom. That was how he claimed the saint had already visited
him, why should not Robert recall it and believe? Certainly he was gone. Why
look for him? Would a modest brother of our house be running through the Welsh
woods mother-naked?” “Are you telling me,” asked Hugh
cautiously, “That what you have there in the reliquary is not… Then the casket
had not yet been sealed?” His eyebrows were tangling with his black forelock,
but his voice was soft and unsurprised. “Well…” Cadfael twitched his blunt brown
nose bashfully between finger and thumb. “Sealed it was, but there are ways of
dealing with seals that leave them unblemished. It’s one of the more dubious of
my remembered skills, but for all that I was glad of it then.” “And you put the lady back in the place
that was hers, along with her champion?” “He was a decent, good man, and had spoken
up for her nobly. She would not grudge him house-room. I have always thought,”
confided Cadfael, “that she was not displeased with us. She has shown her power
in Gwytherin since that time, by many miracles, so I cannot believe she is
angry. But what a little troubles me is that she has not so far chosen to
favour us with any great mark of her patronage here, to keep Robert happy, and
set my mind at rest. Oh, a few little things, but nothing of unmistakable note.
How if I have displeased her, after all? Well for me, who know what we have
within there on the altar—and mea culpa if I did wrongly! But what of the
innocents who do not know, and come in good faith, hoping for grace from her?
What if I have been the means of their deprivation and loss?” “I see,” said Hugh with sympathy, “that
Brother Mark had better make haste through the degrees of ordination, and come
quickly to lift the load from you. Unless,” he added with a flashing sidelong
smile, “Saint Winifred takes pity on you first, and sends you a sign.” “I still do not see,” mused Cadfael, “what
else I could have done. It was an ending that satisfied everyone, both here and
there. The children were free to marry and be happy, the village still had its
saint, and she had her own people round her. Robert had what he had gone to
find—or thought he had, which is the same thing. And Shrewsbury abbey has its
festival, with every hope of a full guest-hall, and glory and gain in good
measure. If she would but just cast an indulgent look this way, and wink her
eye, to let me know I understood her aright.” “And you’ve never said word of this to
anyone?” “Never a word. But the whole village of
Gwytherin knows it,” admitted Cadfael with a remembering grin. “No one told, no
one had to tell, but they knew. There wasn’t a man missing when we took up the
reliquary and set out for home. They helped to carry it, whipped together a
little chariot to bear it. Robert thought he had them nicely tamed, even those
who’d been most reluctant from the first. It was a great joy to him. A simple
soul at bottom! It would be great pity to undo him now, when he’s busy writing
his book about the saint’s life, and how he brought her to Shrewsbury.” “I would not have the heart to put him to
such distress,” said Hugh. “Least said, best for all. Thanks be to God, I have
nothing to do with canon law, the common law of a land almost without law costs
me enough pains.” No need to say that Cadfael could be sure of his secrecy,
that was taken for granted on both sides. “Well, you speak the lady’s own
tongue, no doubt she understood you well enough, with or without words. Who
knows? When this festival of yours takes place—the twenty-second day of June,
you say?—she may take pity on you, and send you a great miracle to set your mind
at rest.” And so she might, thought Cadfael an hour
later, on his way to obey the summons of the Vesper bell. Not that he had
deserved so signal an honour, but there surely must be one somewhere among the
unceasing stream of pilgrims who did deserve it, and could not with justice be
rejected. He would be perfectly and humbly and cheerfully content with that.
What if she was eighty miles or so away, in what was left of her body? It had
been a miraculous body in this life, once brutally dead and raised alive again,
what limits of time or space could be set about such a being? If it so pleased
her she could be both quiet and content in her grave with Rhisiart, lulled by
bird-song in the hawthorn trees, and here attentive and incorporeal, a little
flame of spirit in the coffin of unworthy Columbanus, who had killed not for
her exaltation but for his own. Brother Cadfael went to Vespers curiously
relieved at having confided to his friend a secret from before the time when
they had first known each other, in the beginning as potential antagonists
stepping subtly to outwit each other, then discovering how much they had in
common, the old man—alone with himself Cadfael admitted to being somewhat over
the peak of a man’s prime—and the young one, just setting out, exceedingly
well-equipped in shrewdness and wit, to build his fortune and win his wife. And
both he had done, for he was now undisputed sheriff of Shropshire, if under a
powerless and captive king, and up there in the town, near St Mary’s church,
his wife and his year-old son made a nest for his private happiness when he
shut the door on his public burdens. Cadfael thought of his godson, the sturdy
imp who already clutched his way lustily round the rooms of Hugh’s town house,
climbed unaided into a godfather’s lap, and began to utter human sounds of
approval, enquiry, indignation and affection. Every man asks of heaven a son.
Hugh had his, as promising a sprig as ever budded from the stem. So, by proxy,
had Cadfael, a son in God. There was, after all, a great deal of
human happiness in the world, even a world so torn and mangled with conflict,
cruelty and greed. So it had always been, and always would be. And so be it,
provided the indomitable spark of joy never went out. In the refectory, after supper and grace,
in the grateful warmth and lingering light of the end of May, when they were
shuffling their benches to rise from table, Prior Robert Pennant rose first in
his place, levering erect his more than six feet of lean, austere prelate,
silver-tonsured and ivory-featured. “Brothers, I have received a further
message from Father Abbot. He has reached Warwick on his way home to us, and
hopes to be with us by the fourth day of June or earlier. He bids us be
diligent in making proper preparation for the celebration of Saint Winifred’s
translation, our most gracious patroness.” Perhaps the abbot had so instructed,
in duty bound, but it was Robert himself who laid such stress on it, viewing
himself, as he did, as the patron of their patroness. His large patrician eye
swept round the refectory tables, settling upon those heads most deeply
committed. “Brother Anselm, you have the music already in hand?” Brother Anselm the precentor, whose mind
seldom left its neums and instruments for many seconds together, looked up vaguely,
awoke to the question, and stared, wide-eyed. “The entire order of procession
and office is ready,” he said, in amiable surprise that anyone should feel it
necessary to ask. “And Brother Denis, you have made all the
preparations necessary for stocking your halls to feed great numbers? For we
shall surely need every cot and every dish we can muster.” Brother Denis the hospitaller, accustomed
to outer panics and secure ruler of his own domain, testified calmly that he
had made the fullest provision he considered needful, and further, that he had
reserves laid by to tap at need. “There will also be many sick persons to
be tended, for that reason they come.” Brother Edmund the infirmarer, not waiting
to be named, said crisply that he had taken into account the probable need, and
was prepared for the demands that might be made on his beds and medicines. He
mentioned also, being on his feet, that Brother Cadfael had already provided
stocks of all the remedies most likely to be wanted, and stood ready to meet
any other needs that should arise. “That is well,” said Prior Robert. “Now,
Father Abbot has yet a special request to make until he comes. He asks that
prayers be made at every High Mass for the repose of the soul of a good man,
treacherously slain in Winchester as he strove to keep the peace and reconcile
faction with faction, in Christian duty.” For a moment it seemed to Brother Cadfael,
and perhaps to most of the others present, that the death of one man, far away
in the south, hardly rated so solemn a mention and so signal a mark of respect,
in a country where deaths had been commonplace for so long, from the field of
Lincoln strewn with bodies to the sack of Worcester with its streets running
blood, from the widespread baronial slaughters by disaffected earls to the
sordid village banditries where law had broken down. Then he looked at it
again, and with the abbot’s measuring eyes. Here was a good man cut down in the
very city where prelates and barons were parleying over matters of peace and
sovereignty, killed in trying to keep one faction from the throat of the other.
At the very feet, as it were, of the bishop-legate. As black a sacrilege as if
he had been butchered on the steps of the altar. It was not one man’s death, it
was a bitter symbol of the abandonment of law and the rejection of hope and
reconciliation. So Radulfus had seen it, and so he recorded it in the offices
of his house. There was a solemn acknowledgement due to the dead man, a
memorial lodged in heaven. “We are asked,” said Prior Robert, “to
offer thanks for the just endeavour and prayers for the soul of one Rainald
Bossard, a knight in the service of the Empress Maud.” “One of the enemy,” said a young novice
doubtfully, talking it over in the cloisters afterwards. So used were they, in
this shire, to thinking of the king’s cause as their own, since it had been his
writ which had run here now in orderly fashion for four years, and kept off the
worst of the chaos that troubled so much of England elsewhere. “Not so,” said Brother Paul, the master of
the novices, gently chiding. “No good and honourable man is an enemy, though he
may take the opposing side in this dissension.” “The fealty of this world is not for us,
but we must bear it ever in mind as a true value, as binding on those who owe
it as our vows are on us. The claims of these two cousins are both in some sort
valid. It is no reproach to have kept faith, whether with king or empress. And
this was surely a worthy man, or Father Abbot would not thus have recommended
him to our prayers.” Brother Anselm, thoughtfully revolving the
syllables of the name, and tapping the resultant rhythm on the stone of the
bench on which he sat, repeated to himself softly: “Rainald Bossard, Rainald
Bossard…” The repeated iambic stayed in Brother Cadfael’s
ear and wormed its way into his mind. A name that meant nothing yet to anyone
here, had neither form nor face, no age, no character; nothing but a name,
which is either a soul without a body or a body without a soul. It went with
him into his cell in the dortoir, as he made his last prayers and shook off his
sandals before lying down to sleep. It may even have kept a rhythm in his
sleeping mind, without the need of a dream to house it, for the first he knew
of the thunderstorm was a silent double-gleam of lightning that spelled out the
same iambic, and caused him to start awake with eyes still closed, and listen
for the answering thunder. It did not come for so long that he thought he had
dreamed it, and then he heard it, very distant, very quiet, and yet curiously
ominous. Beyond his closed eyelids the quiet lightnings flared and died, and
the echoes answered so late and so softly, from so far away… As far, perhaps, as that fabled city of
Winchester, where momentous matters had been decided, a place Cadfael had never
seen, and probably never would see. A threat from a town so distant could shake
no foundations here, and no hearts, any more than such far-off thunders could
bring down the walls of Shrewsbury. Yet the continuing murmur of disquiet was still
in his ears as he fell asleep. Chapter Two ABBOT RADULFUS RODE BACK into his abbey of
Saint Peter and Saint Paul on the third day of June, escorted by his chaplain
and secretary, Brother Vitalis, and welcomed home by all the fifty-three
brothers, seven novices and six schoolboys of his house, as well as all the lay
stewards and servants. The abbot was a long, lean, hard man in
his fifties, with a gaunt, ascetic face and a shrewd, scholar’s eye, so
vigorous and able of body that he dismounted and went straight to preside at
High Mass, before retiring to remove the stains of travel or take any
refreshment after his long ride. Nor did he forget to offer the prayer he had
enjoined upon his flock, for the repose of the soul of Rainald Bossard, slain
in Winchester on the evening of Wednesday, the ninth day of April of this year
of Our Lord 1141. Eight weeks dead, and half the length of England away, what
meaning could Rainald Bossard have for this indifferent town of Shrewsbury, or
the members of this far-distant Benedictine house? Not until the next morning’s chapter would
the household hear its abbot’s account of that momentous council held in the
south to determine the future of England; but when Hugh Beringar waited upon
Radulfus about mid-afternoon, and asked for audience, he was not kept waiting.
Affairs demanded the close co-operation of the secular and the clerical powers,
in defence of such order and law as survived in England. The abbot’s private parlour in his lodging
was as austere as its presiding father, plainly furnished, but with sunlight
spilled across its flagged floor from two open lattices at this hour of the
sun’s zenith, and a view of gracious greenery and glowing flowers in the small
walled garden without. Quiverings of radiance flashed and vanished and recoiled
and collided over the dark panelling within, from the new-budded life and fresh
breeze and exuberant light outside. Hugh sat in shadow, and watched the abbot’s
trenchant profile, clear, craggy and dark against a ground of shifting brightness. “My allegiance is well known to you,
Father,” said Hugh, admiring the stillness of the noble mask thus framed, “as
yours is to me. But there is much that we share. Whatever you can tell me of
what passed in Winchester, I do greatly need to know.” “And I to understand,” said Radulfus, with
a tight and rueful smile. “I went as summoned, by him who has a right to summon
me, and I went knowing how matters then stood, the king a prisoner, the empress
mistress of much of the south, and in due position to claim sovereignty by
right of conquest. We knew, you and I both, what would be in debate down there.
I can only give you my own account as I saw it. The first day that we gathered
there, a Monday it was, the seventh of April, there was nothing done by way of
business but the ceremonial of welcoming us all, and reading out—there were
many of these!—the letters sent by way of excuse from those who remained
absent. The empress had a lodging in the town then, though she made several
moves about the region, to Reading and other places, while we debated. She did
not attend. She has a measure of discretion.” His tone was dry. It was not
clear whether he considered her measure of that commodity to be adequate or
somewhat lacking. “The second day…” He fell silent, remembering what he had
witnessed. Hugh waited attentively, not stirring. “The second day, the eighth of April, the
legate made his great speech…” It was no effort to imagine him. Henry of
Blois, bishop of Winchester, papal legate, younger brother and hitherto
partisan of King Stephen, impregnably ensconced in the chapter house of his own
cathedral, secure master of the political pulse of England, the cleverest
manipulator in the kingdom, and on his own chosen ground—and yet hounded on to
the defensive, in so far as that could ever happen to so expert a practitioner.
Hugh had never seen the man, never been near the region where he ruled, had
only heard him described, and yet could see him now, presiding with imperious
composure over his half-unwilling assembly. A difficult part he had to play, to
extricate himself from his known allegiance to his brother, and yet preserve
his face and his status and influence with those who had shared it. And with a
tough, experienced woman narrowly observing his every word, and holding in
reserve her own new powers to destroy or preserve, according to how he managed
his ill-disciplined team in this heavy furrow. “He spoke a tedious while,” said the abbot
candidly, “but he is a very able speaker. He put us in mind that we were met
together to try to salvage England from chaos and ruin. He spoke of the late
King Henry’s time, when order and peace was kept throughout the land. And he
reminded us how the old king, left without a son, commanded his barons to swear
an oath of allegiance to his only remaining child, his daughter Maud the
empress, now widowed, and wed again to the count of Anjou.” And so those barons had done, almost all,
not least this same Henry of Winchester. Hugh Beringar, who had never come to
such a test until he was ready to choose for himself, curled a half-disdainful
and half-commiserating lip, and nodded understanding. “His lordship had
somewhat to explain away.” The abbot refrained from indicating, by
word or look, agreement with the implied criticism of his brother cleric. “He
said that the long delay which might then have arisen from the empress’s being
in Normandy had given rise to natural concern for the well-being of the state.
An interim of uncertainty was dangerous. And thus, he said, his brother Count Stephen
was accepted when he offered himself, and became king by consent. His own part
in this acceptance he admitted. For he it was who pledged his word to God and
men that King Stephen would honour and revere the Holy Church, and maintain the
good and just laws of the land. In which undertaking, said Henry, the king has
shamefully failed. To his great chagrin and grief he declared it, having been
his brother’s guarantor to God.” So that was the way round the humiliating
change of course, thought Hugh. All was to be laid upon Stephen, who had so
deceived his reverend brother and defaulted upon all his promises, that a man
of God might well be driven to the end of his patience, and be brought to
welcome a change of monarch with relief tempering his sorrow. “In particular,” said Radulfus, “he
recalled how the king had hounded certain of his bishops to their ruin and
death.” There was more than a grain of truth in
that, though the only death in question, of Robert of Salisbury, had resulted
naturally from old age, bitterness and despair, because his power was gone. “Therefore, he said,” continued the abbot
with chill deliberation, “the judgement of God had been manifested against the
king, in delivering him up prisoner to his enemies. And he, devout in the service
of the Holy Church, must choose between his devotion to his mortal brother and
to his immortal father, and could not but bow to the edict of heaven. Therefore
he had called us together, to ensure that a kingdom lopped of its head should
not founder in utter ruin. And this very matter, he told the assembly, had been
discussed most gravely on the day previous among the greater part of the clergy
of England, who—he said!—had a prerogative surmounting others in the election
and consecration of a king.” There was something in the dry, measured
voice that made Hugh prick up his ears. For this was a large and unprecedented
claim, and by all the signs Abbot Radulfus found it more than suspect. The
legate had his own face to save, and a well-oiled tongue with which to wind the
protective mesh of words before it. “Was there such a meeting? Were you
present at such, Father?” “There was a meeting,” said Radulfus, “not
prolonged, and by no means very clear in its course. The greater part of the
talking was done by the legate. The empress had her partisans there.” He said
it sedately and tolerantly, but clearly he had not been one. “I do not recall
that he then claimed this prerogative for us. Nor that there was ever a count
taken.” “Nor, as I guess, declared. It would not
come to a numbering of heads or hands.” Too easy, then, to start a
counter-count of one’s own, and confound the reckoning. “He continued,” said Radulfus coolly and
drily, “by saying that we had chosen as Lady of England the late king’s
daughter, the inheritor of his nobility and his will to peace. As the sire was
unequalled in merit in our times, so might his daughter flourish and bring
peace, as he did, to this troubled country, where we now offer her—he said!—our
whole-hearted fealty.” So the legate had extricated himself as
adroitly as possible from his predicament. But for all that, so resolute,
courageous and vindictive a lady as the empress was going to look somewhat
sidewise at a whole-hearted fealty which had already once been pledged to her,
and turned its back nimbly under pressure, and might as nimbly do so again. If
she was wise she would curb her resentment and take care to keep on the right
side of the legate, as he was cautiously feeling his way to the right side of
her; but she would not forget or forgive. “And there was no man raised a word
against it?” asked Hugh mildly. “None. There was small opportunity, and
even less inducement. And with that the bishop announced that he had invited a
deputation from the city of London, and expected them to arrive that day, so
that it was expedient we should adjourn our discussion until the morrow. Even
so, the Londoners did not come until next day, and we met again somewhat later
than on the days previous. Howbeit, they did come. With somewhat dour faces and
stiff necks. They said that they represented the whole commune of London, into
which many barons had also entered as members after Lincoln, and that they all,
with no wish to challenge the legitimacy of our assembly, yet desired to put
forward with one voice the request that the lord king should be set at
liberty.” “That was bold,” said Hugh with raised
brows. “How did his lordship counter it? Was he put out of countenance?” “I think he was shaken, but not
disastrously, not then. He made a long speech—it is a way of keeping others
silent, at least for a time—reproving the city for taking into its membership
men who had abandoned their king in war, after leading him astray by their evil
advice, so grossly that he forsook God and right, and was brought to the
judgement of defeat and captivity, from which the prayers of those same false
friends could not now reprieve him. These men do but flatter and favour you
now, he said, for their own advantage.” “If he meant the Flemings who ran from
Lincoln,” Hugh allowed, “he told no more than truth there. But for what other
end is the city ever flattered and wooed? What then? Had they the hardihood to
stand their ground against him?” “They were in some disarray as to what
they should reply, and went apart to confer. And while there was quiet, a man
suddenly stepped forward from among the clerks, and held out a parchment to
Bishop Henry, asking him to read it aloud, so confidently that I wonder still
he did not at once comply. Instead, he opened and began to read it in silence,
and in a moment more he was thundering in a great rage that the thing was an
insult to the reverend company present, its matter disgraceful, its witnesses
attainted enemies of Holy Church, and not a word of it would he read aloud to
us in so sacred a place as his chapter house. “Whereupon,” said the abbot
grimly, “the clerk snatched it back from him, and himself read it aloud in a
great voice, riding above the bishop when he tried to silence him. It was a
plea from Stephen’s queen to all present, and to the legate in especial, own
brother to the king, to return to fealty and restore the king to his own again
from the base captivity into which traitors had betrayed him. And I, said the
brave man who read, am a clerk in the service of Queen Matilda, and if any ask
my name, it is Christian, and true Christian I am as any here, and true to my
salt.” “Brave, indeed!” said Hugh, and whistled
softly. “But I doubt it did him little good.” “The legate replied to him in a tirade,
much as he had spoken already to us the day before, but in a great passion, and
so intimidated the men from London that they drew in their horns, and
grudgingly agreed to report the council’s election to their citizens, and
support it as best they could. As for the man Christian, who had so angered
Bishop Henry, he was attacked that same evening in the street, as he set out to
return to the queen empty-handed. Four or five ruffians set on him in the dark,
no one knows who, for they fled when one of the empress’s knights and his men came
to the rescue and beat them off, crying shame to use murder as argument in any
cause, and against an honest man who had done his part fearlessly in the open.
The clerk got no worse than a few bruises. It was the knight who got the knife
between his ribs from behind and into the heart. He died in the gutter of a
Winchester street. A shame to us all, who claim to be making peace and bringing
enemies into amity.” By the shadowed anger of his face it had
gone deep with him, the single wanton act that denied all pretences of good
will and justice and conciliation. To strike at a man for being honestly of the
opposite persuasion, and then to strike again at the fair-minded and chivalrous
who sought to prevent the outrage—very ill omens, these, for the future of the
legate’s peace. “And no man taken for the killing?”
demanded Hugh, frowning. “No. They fled in the dark. If any
creature knows name or hiding-place, he has spoken no word. Death is so common
a matter now, even by stealth and treachery in the darkness, this will be
forgotten with the rest. And the next day our council closed with sentence of
excommunication against a great number of Stephen’s men, and the legate
pronounced all men blessed who would bless the empress, and accursed those who
cursed her. And so dismissed us,” said Radulfus. “But that we monastics were
not dismissed, but kept to attend on him some weeks longer.” “And the empress?” “Withdrew to Oxford, while these long
negotiations with the city of London went on, how and when she should be admitted
within the gates, on what terms, what numbers she might bring in with her to
Westminster. On all which points they have wrangled every step of the way. But
in nine or ten days now she will be installed there, and soon thereafter
crowned.” He lifted a long, muscular hand, and again let it fall into the lap
of his habit. “So, at least, it seems. What more can I tell you of her?” “I meant, rather,” said Hugh, “how is she
bearing this slow recognition? How is she dealing with her newly converted
barons? And how do they rub, one with another? It’s no easy matter to hold
together the old and the new liegemen, and keep them from each other’s throats.
A manor in dispute here and there, a few fields taken from one and given to
another… I think you know the way of it, Father, as well as I.” “I would not say she is a wise woman,”
said Radulfus carefully. “She is all too well aware how many swore allegiance
to her at her father’s order, and then swung to King Stephen, and now as nimbly
skip back to her because she is in the ascendant. I can well understand she
might take pleasure in pricking into the quick where she can, among these. It
is not wise, but it is human. But that she should become lofty and cold to
those who never wavered—for there are some,” said the abbot with respectful
wonder, “who have been faithful throughout at their own great loss, and will
not waver even now, whatever she may do. Great folly and great injustice to use
them so highhandedly, who have been her right hand and her left all this while.” You comfort me, thought Hugh, watching the
lean, quiet face intently. The woman is out of her wits if she flouts even the
like of Robert of Gloucester, now she feels herself so near the throne. “She has greatly offended the
bishop-legate,” said the abbot, “by refusing to allow Stephen’s son to receive
the rights and titles of his father’s honours of Boulogne and Mortain, now that
his father is a prisoner. It would have been only justice. But no, she would
not suffer it. Bishop Henry quit her court for some while, it took her
considerable pains to lure him back again.” Better and better, thought Hugh, assessing
his position with care. If she is stubborn enough to drive away even Henry, she
can undo everything he and others do for her. Put the crown in her hands and
she may, not so much drop it, as hurl it at someone against whom she has a
score to settle. He set himself to extract every detail of her subsequent
behaviour, and was cautiously encouraged. She had taken land from some who held
it and given it to others. She had received her naturally bashful new adherents
with arrogance, and reminded them ominously of their past hostility. Some she
had even repulsed with anger, recalling old injuries. Candidates for a disputed
crown should be more accommodatingly forgetful. Let her alone, and pray! She,
if anyone, could bring about her own ruin. At the end of a long hour he rose to take
his leave, with a very fair picture in his mind of the possibilities he had to
face. Even empresses may learn, and she might yet inveigle herself safely into
Westminster and assume the crown. It would not do to underestimate William of
Normandy’s grand-daughter and Henry the First’s daughter. Yet that very stock
might come to wreck on its own unforgiving strength. He was never afterwards sure why he turned
back at the last moment to ask: “Father Abbot, this man Rainald Bossard, who
died… A knight of the empress, you said. In whose following?” All that he had learned he confided to
Brother Cadfael in the hut in the herb-garden, trying out upon his friend’s
unexcitable solidity his own impressions and doubts, like a man sharpening a
scythe on a good memorial stone. Cadfael was fussing over a too-exuberant wine,
and seemed not to be listening, but Hugh remained undeceived. His friend had a
sharp ear cocked for every intonation, even turned a swift glance occasionally
to confirm what his ear heard, and reckon up the double account. “You’d best lean back, then,” said Cadfael
finally, “and watch what will follow. You might also, I suppose, have a good
man take a look at Bristol? He is the only hostage she has. With the king
loosed, or Robert, or Brian Fitz-Count, or some other of sufficient note made
prisoner to match him, you’d be on secure ground. God forgive me, why am I
advising you, who have no prince in this world!” But he was none too sure about
the truth of that, having had brief, remembered dealings with Stephen himself,
and liked the man, even at his ill-advised worst, when he had slaughtered the
garrison of Shrewsbury castle, to regret it as long as his ebullient memory
kept nudging him with the outrage. By now, in his dungeon in Bristol, he might
well have forgotten the uncharacteristic savagery. “And do you know,” asked Hugh with
deliberation, “whose man was this knight Rainald Bossard, left bleeding to
death in the lanes of Winchester? He for whom your prayers have been demanded?” Cadfael turned from his boisterously
bubbling jar to narrow his eyes on his friend’s face. “The empress’s man is all
we’ve been told. But I see you’re about to tell me more.” “He was in the following of Laurence
d’Angers.” Cadfael straightened up with incautious
haste, and grunted at the jolt to his ageing back. It was the name of a man
neither of them had ever set eyes on, yet it started vivid memories for them
both. “Yes, that Laurence! A baron of
Gloucestershire, and liegeman to the empress. One of the few who has not once
turned his coat yet in this to-ing and fro-ing, and uncle to those two children
you helped away from Bromfield to join him, when they went astray after the
sack of Worcester. Do you still remember the cold of that winter? And the wind
that scoured away hills of snow overnight and laid them down in fresh places
before morning? I still feel it, clean through flesh and bone…” There was nothing about that winter
journey that Cadfael would ever forget. It was hardly a year and a half past,
the attack on the city of Worcester, the flight of brother and sister
northwards towards Shrewsbury, through the worst weather for many a year.
Laurence d’Angers had been but a name in the business, as he was now in this.
An adherent of the Empress Maud, he had been denied leave to enter King
Stephen’s territory to search for his young kin, but he had sent a squire in
secret to find and fetch them away. To have borne a hand in the escape of those
three was something to remember lifelong. All three arose living before
Cadfael’s mind’s eye, the boy Yves, thirteen years old then, ingenuous and
gallant and endearing, jutting a stubborn Norman chin at danger, his elder
sister Ermina, newly shaken into womanhood and resolutely shouldering the
consequences of her own follies. And the third… “I have often wondered,” said Hugh
thoughtfully, “how they fared afterwards. I knew you would get them off safely,
if I left it to you, but it was still a perilous road before them. I wonder if
we shall ever get word. Some day the world will surely hear of Yves Hugonin.”
At the thought of the boy he smiled with affectionate amusement. “And that dark
lad who fetched them away, he who dressed like a woodsman and fought like a
paladin… I fancy you knew more of him than ever I got to know.” Cadfael smiled into the glow of the
brazier and did not deny it. “So his lord is there in the empress’s train, is
he? And this knight who was killed was in d’Angers’ service? That was a very
ill thing, Hugh.” “So Abbot Radulfus thinks,” said Hugh
sombrely. “In the dusk and in confusion—and all got
clean away, even the one who used the knife. A foul thing, for surely that was
no chance blow. The clerk Christian escaped out of their hands, yet one among
them turned on the rescuer before he fled. It argues a deal of hate at being
thwarted, to have ventured that last moment before running. And is it left so?
And Winchester full of those who should most firmly stand for justice?” “Why, some among them would surely have
been well enough pleased if that bold clerk had spilled his blood in the
gutter, as well as the knight. Some may well have set the hunt on him.” “Well for the empress’s good name,” said
Cadfael, “that there was one at least of her men stout enough to respect an
honest opponent, and stand by him to the death. And shame if that death goes
unpaid for.” “Old friend,” said Hugh ruefully, rising
to take his leave, “England has had to swallow many such a shame these last
years. It grows customary to sigh and shrug and forget. At which, as I know,
you are a very poor hand. And I have seen you overturn custom more than once,
and been glad of it. But not even you can do much now for Rainald Bossard, bar
praying for his soul. It is a very long way from here to Winchester.” “It is not so far,” said Cadfael, as much
to himself as to his friend, “not by many a mile, as it was an hour since.” He went to Vespers, and to supper in the
refectory, and thereafter to Collations and Compline, and all with one
remembered face before his mind’s eye, so that he paid but fractured attention
to the readings, and had difficulty in concentrating his thoughts on prayer.
Though it might have been a kind of prayer he was offering throughout, in
gratitude and praise and humility. So suave, so young, so dark and vital a
face, startling in its beauty when he had first seen it over the girl’s
shoulder, the face of the young squire sent to bring away the Hugonin children
to their uncle and guardian. A long, spare, wide-browed face, with a fine
scimitar of a nose and a supple bow of a mouth, and the fierce, fearless,
golden eyes of a hawk. A head capped closely with curving, blue-black hair,
coiling crisply at his temples and clasping his cheeks like folded wings. So
young and yet so formed a face, east and west at home in it, shaven clean like
a Norman, olive-skinned like a Syrian, all his memories of the Holy Land in one
human countenance. The favourite squire of Laurence d’Angers, come home with
him from the Crusade. Olivier de Bretagne. If his lord was there in the south with
his following, in the empress’s retinue, where else would Olivier be? The abbot
might even have rubbed shoulders with him, unbeknown, or seen him ride past at
his lord’s elbow, and for one absent moment admired his beauty. Few such faces
blaze out of the humble mass of our ordinariness, thought Cadfael, the finger
of God cannot choose but mark them out for notice, and his officers here will
be the first to recognise and own them. And this Rainald Bossard who is dead, an
honourable man doing right by an honourable opponent, was Olivier’s comrade,
owning the same lord and pledged to the same service. His death will be grief
to Olivier. Grief to Olivier is grief to me, a wrong done to Olivier is a wrong
done to me. As far away as Winchester may be, here am I left mourning in that
dark street where a man died for a generous act, in which, by the same token,
he did not fail, for the clerk Christian lived on to return to his lady, the
queen, with his errand faithfully done. The gentle rustlings and stirrings of the
dortoir sighed into silence outside the frail partitions of Cadfael’s cell long
before he rose from his knees, and shook off his sandals. The little lamp by
the night stairs cast only the faintest gleam across the beams of the roof, a
ceiling of pearly grey above the darkness of his cell, his home now for—was it
eighteen years or nineteen?—he had difficulty in recalling. It was as if a part
of him, heart, mind, soul, whatever that essence might be, had not so much
retired as come home to take seisin of a heritage here, his from his birth. And
yet he remembered and acknowledged with gratitude and joy the years of his
sojourning in the world, the lusty childhood and venturous youth, the taking of
the Cross and the passion of the Crusade, the women he had known and loved, the
years of his sea-faring off the coast of the Holy Kingdom of Jerusalem, all
that pilgrimage that had led him here at last to his chosen retreat. None of it
wasted, however foolish and amiss, nothing lost, nothing vain, all of it
somehow fitting him to the narrow niche where now he served and rested. God had
given him a sign, he had no need to regret anything, only to lay all open and
own it his. For God’s viewing, not for man’s. He lay quiet in the darkness, straight and
still like a man coffined, but easy, with his arms lax at his sides, and his
half-closed eyes dreaming on the vault above him, where the faint light played
among the beams. There was no lightning that night, only a
consort of steady rolls of thunder both before and after Matins and Lauds, so
unalarming that many among the brothers failed to notice them. Cadfael heard
them as he rose, and as he returned to his rest. They seemed to him a reminder
and a reassurance that Winchester had indeed moved nearer to Shrewsbury, and
consoled him that his grievance was not overlooked, but noted in heaven, and he
might look to have his part yet in collecting the debt due to Rainald Bossard. Upon
which warranty, he fell asleep. Chapter Three ON THE SEVENTEENTH DAY of June Saint
Winifred’s elaborate oak coffin, silver-ornamented and lined with lead behind
all its immaculate seals, was removed from its place of honour and carried with
grave and subdued ceremony back to its temporary resting-place in the chapel of
the hospital of Saint Giles, there to wait, as once before, for the auspicious
day, the twenty-second of June. The weather was fair, sunny and still, barely a
cloud in the sky, and yet cool enough for travelling, the best of weather for
pilgrims. And by the eighteenth day the pilgrims began to arrive, a scattering
of fore-runners before the full tide began to flow. Brother Cadfael had watched the reliquary
depart on its memorial journey with a slightly guilty mind, for all his honest
declaration that he could hardly have done otherwise than he had done, there in
the summer night in Gwytherin. So strongly had he felt, above all, her
Welshness, the feeling she must have for the familiar tongue about her, and the
tranquil flow of the seasons in her solitude, where she had slept so long and
so well in her beatitude, and worked so many small, sweet miracles for her own
people. No, he could not believe he had made a wrong choice there. If only she
would glance his way, and smile, and say, well done! The very first of the pilgrims came
probing into the walled herb-garden, with Brother Denis’s directions to guide
him, in search of a colleague in his own mystery. Cadfael was busy weeding the close-planted
beds of mint and thyme and sage late in the afternoon, a tedious, meticulous
labour in the ripeness of a favourable June, after spring sun and shower had
been nicely balanced, and growth was a green battlefield. He backed out of a
cleansed bed, and backed into a solid form, rising startled from his knees to
turn and face a rusty black brother shaped very much like himself, though
probably fifteen years younger. They stood at gaze, two solid, squarely built
brethren of the Order, eyeing each other in instant recognition and
acknowledgement. “You must be Brother Cadfael,” said the
stranger-brother in a broad, melodious bass voice. “Brother Hospitaller told me
where to find you. My name is Adam, a brother of Reading. I have the very
charge there that you bear here, and I have heard tell of you, even as far
south as my house.” His eye was roving, as he spoke, towards
some of Cadfael’s rarer treasures, the eastern poppies he had brought from the
Holy Land and reared here with anxious care, the delicate fig that still
contrived to thrive against the sheltering north wall, where the sun nursed it.
Cadfael warmed to him for the quickening of his eye, and the mild greed that
flushed the round, shaven face. A sturdy, stalwart man, who moved as if
confident of his body, one who might prove a man of his hands if challenged.
Well-weathered, too, a genuine outdoor man. “You’re more than welcome, brother,” said
Cadfael heartily. “You’ll be here for the saint’s feast? And have they found
you a place in the dortoir? There are a few cells vacant, for any of our own
who come, like you.” “My abbot sent me from Reading with a
mission to our daughter house of Leominster,” said Brother Adam, probing with
an experimental toe into the rich, well-fed loam of Brother Cadfael’s bed of
mint, and raising an eyebrow respectfully at the quality he found. “I asked if
I might prolong the errand to attend on the translation of Saint Winifred, and
I was given the needful permission. It’s seldom I could hope to be sent so far
north, and it would be pity to miss such an opportunity.” “And they’ve found you a brother’s bed?”
Such a man, Benedictine, gardener and herbalist, could not be wasted on a bed
in the guest-hall. Cadfael coveted him, marking the bright eye with which the
newcomer singled out his best endeavours. “Brother Hospitaller was so gracious. I am
placed in a cell close to the novices.” “We shall be near neighbours,” said
Cadfael contentedly. “Now come, I’ll show you whatever we have here to show,
for the main garden is on the far side of the Foregate, along the bank of the
river. But here I keep my own herber. And if there should be anything here that
can be safely carried to Reading, you may take cuttings most gladly before you
leave us.” They fell into a very pleasant and voluble
discussion, perambulating all the walks of the closed garden, and comparing
experiences in cultivation and use. Brother Adam of Reading had a sharp eye for
rarities, and was likely to go home laden with spoils. He admired the neatness
and order of Cadfael’s workshop, the collection of rustling bunches of dried
herbs hung from the roof-beams and under the eaves, and the array of bottles,
jars and flagons along the shelves. He had hints and tips of his own to
propound, too, and the amiable contest kept them happy all the afternoon. When
they returned together to the great court before Vespers it was to a scene
notably animated, as if the bustle of celebration was already beginning. There
were horses being led down into the stableyard, and bundles being carried in at
the guest-hall. A stout elderly man, well equipped for riding, paced across
towards the church to pay his first respects on arrival, with a servant
trotting at his heels. Brother Paul’s youngest charges, all eyes
and curiosity, ringed the gatehouse to watch the early arrivals, and were
shooed aside by Brother Jerome, very busy as usual with all the prior’s
errands. Though the boys did not go very far, and formed their ring again as
soon as Jerome was out of sight. A few of the citizens of the Foregate had
gathered in the street to watch, excited dogs running among their legs. “Tomorrow,” said Cadfael, eyeing the
scene, “there will be many more. This is but the beginning. Now if the weather
stays fair we shall have a very fine festival for our saint.” And she will understand that all is in her
honour, he thought privately, even if she does lie very far from here. And who
knows whether she may not pay us a visit, out of the kindness of her heart?
What is distance to a saint, who can be where she wills in the twinkling of an
eye? The guest-hall filled steadily on the
morrow. All day long they came, some singly, some in groups as they had met and
made comfortable acquaintance on the road, some afoot, some on ponies, some
whole and hearty and on holiday, some who had travelled only a few miles, some
who came from far away, and among them a number who went on crutches, or were
led along by better-sighted friends, or had grievous deformities or skin
diseases, or debilitating illnesses; and all these hoping for relief. Cadfael went about the regular duties of
his day, divided between church and herbarium, but with an interested eye open
for all there was to see whenever he crossed the great court, boiling now with
activity. Every arriving figure, every face, engaged his notice, but as yet
distantly, none being provided with a name, to make him individual. Such of
them as needed his services for relief would be directed to him, such as came
his way by chance would be entitled to his whole attention, freely offered. It was the woman he noticed first,
bustling across the court from the gatehouse to the guest-hall with a basket on
her arm, fresh from the Foregate market with new-baked bread and little cakes,
soon after Prime. A careful housewife, to be off marketing so early even on
holiday, decided about what she wanted, and not content to rely on the abbey
bakehouse to provide it. A sturdy, confident figure of a woman, perhaps fifty
years of age but in full rosy bloom. Her dress was sober and plain, but of good
material and proudly kept, her wimple snow-white beneath her head-cloth of
brown linen. She was not tall, but so erect that she could pass for tall, and
her face was round, wide-eyed and broad-cheeked, with a determined chin to it. She vanished briskly into the guest-hall,
and he caught but a glimpse of her, but she was positive enough to stay with
him through the offices and duties of the morning, and as the worshippers left
the church after Mass he caught sight of her again, arms spread like a hen-wife
driving her birds, marshalling two chicks, it seemed, before her, both largely
concealed beyond her ample width and bountiful skirts. Indeed she had a general
largeness about her, her head-dress surely taller and broader than need, her
hips bolstered by petticoats, the aura of bustle and command she bore about
with her equally generous and ebullient. He felt a wave of warmth go out to her
for her energy and vigour, while he spared a morsel of sympathy for the chicks
she mothered, stowed thus away beneath such ample, smothering wings. In the afternoon, busy about his small
kingdom and putting together the medicaments he must take along the Foregate to
Saint Giles in the morning, to be sure they had provision enough over the
feast, he was not thinking of her, nor of any of the inhabitants of the
guest-hall, since none had as yet had occasion to call for his aid. He was
packing lozenges into a small box, soothing tablets for scoured, dry throats,
when a bulky shadow blocked the open door of his workshop, and a brisk, light
voice said, “Pray your pardon, brother, but Brother Denis advised me to come to
you, and sent me here.” And there she stood, filling the doorway,
shoulders squared, hands folded at her waist, head braced and face full
forward. Her eyes, wide and wide-set, were bright blue but meagrely supplied
with pale lashes, yet very firm and fixed in their regard. “It’s my young nephew, you see, brother,”
she went on confidently, “my sister’s son, that was fool enough to go off and
marry a roving Welshman from Builth, and now her man’s gone, and so is she,
poor lass, and left her two children orphan, and nobody to care for them but
me. And me with my own husband dead, and all his craft fallen to me to manage,
and never a chick of my own to be my comfort. Not but what I can do very well
with the work and the journeymen, for I’ve learned these twenty years what was
what in the weaving trade, but still I could have done with a son of my own.
But it was not to be, and a sister’s son is dearly welcome, so he is, whether he
has his health or no, for he’s the dearest lad ever you saw. And it’s the pain,
you see, brother. I don’t like to see him in pain, though he doesn’t complain.
So I’m come to you.” Cadfael made haste to wedge a toe into
this first chink in her volubility, and insert a few words of his own into the
gap. “Come within, mistress, and welcome. Tell
me what’s the nature of your lad’s pain, and what I can do for you and him I’ll
do. But best I should see him and speak with him, for he best knows where he
hurts. Sit down and be easy, and tell me about him.” She came in confidently enough, and
settled herself with a determined spreading of ample skirts on the bench
against the wall. Her gaze went round the laden shelves, the stored herbs
dangling, the brazier and the pots and flasks, interested and curious, but in
no way awed by Cadfael or his mysteries. “I’m from the cloth country down by
Campden, brother, Weaver by name and by trade was my man, and his father and
grandfather before him, and Alice Weaver is my name, and I keep up the work
just as he did. But this young sister of mine, she went off with a Welshman,
and the pair of them are dead now, and the children I sent for to live with me.
The girl is eighteen years old now, a good, hard-working maid, and I daresay we
shall contrive to find a decent match for her in the end, though I shall miss
her help, for she’s grown very handy, and is strong and healthy, not like the
lad. Named for some outlandish Welsh saint, she is, Melangell, if ever you
heard the like!” “I’m Welsh myself,” said Cadfael
cheerfully. “Our Welsh names do come hard on your English tongues, I know.” “Ah well, the boy brought a name with him
that’s short and simple enough. Rhun, they named him. Sixteen he is now, two
years younger than his sister, but wants her heartiness, poor soul. He’s
well-grown enough, and very comely, but from a child something went wrong with
his right leg, it’s twisted and feebled so he can put but the very toe of it to
the ground at all, and even that turned on one side, and can lay no weight on
it, but barely touch. He goes on two crutches. And I’ve brought him here in the
hope good Saint Winifred will do something for him. But it’s cost him dear to
make the walk, even though we started out three weeks ago, and have taken it by
easy shifts.” “He’s walked the whole way?” asked
Cadfael, dismayed. “I’m not so prosperous I can afford a
horse, more than the one they need for the business at home. Twice on the way a
kind carter did give him a ride as far as he was bound, but the rest he’s
hobbled on his crutches. Many another at this feast, brother, will have done as
much, in as bad case or worse. But he’s here now, safe in the guest-hall, and
if my prayers can do anything for him, he’ll walk home again on two sound legs
as ever held up a hale and hearty man. But now for these few days he suffers as
bad as before.” “You should have brought him here with
you,” said Cadfael. “What’s the nature of his pain? Is it in moving, or when he
lies still? Is it the bones of the leg that ache?” “It’s worst in his bed at night. At home
I’ve often heard him weeping for pain in the night, though he tries to keep it
so silent we need not be disturbed. Often he gets little or no sleep. His bones
do ache, that’s truth, but also the sinews of his calf knot into such cramps it
makes him groan.” “There can be something done about that,”
said Cadfael, considering. “At least we may try. And there are draughts can
dull the pain and help him to a night’s sleep, at any rate.” “It isn’t that I don’t trust to the saint,”
explained Mistress Weaver anxiously. “But while he waits for her, let him be at
rest if he can, that’s what I say. Why should not a suffering lad seek help
from ordinary decent mortals, too, good men like you who have faith and
knowledge both?” “Why not, indeed!” agreed Cadfael. “The
least of us may be an instrument of grace, though not by his own deserving.
Better let the boy come to me here, where we can be private together. The
guest-hall will be busy and noisy, here we shall have quiet.” She rose, satisfied, to take her leave,
but she had plenty yet to say even in departing of the long, slow journey, the
small kindnesses they had met with on the way, and the fellow pilgrims, some of
whom had passed them and arrived here before them. “There’s more than one in there,” said
she, wagging her head towards the lofty rear wall of the guest-hall, “will be
needing your help, besides my Rhun. There were two young fellows we came along
with the last days, we could keep pace with them, for they were slowed much as
we were. Oh, the one of them was hale and lusty enough, but would not stir a
step ahead of his friend, and that poor soul had come barefoot more miles even
than Rhun had come crippled, and his feet a sight for pity, but would he so
much as bind them with rags? Not he! He said he was under vow to go unshod to
his journey’s end. And a great heavy cross on a string round his neck, too, and
he rubbed raw with the chafing of it, but that was part of his vow, too. I see
no reason why a fine young fellow should choose such a torment of his own will,
but there, folk do strange things, I daresay he hopes to win some great mercy
for himself with his austerities. Still, I should think he might at least get
some balm for his feet, while he’s here at rest? Shall I bid him come to you?
I’d gladly do a small service for that pair. The other one, Matthew, the sturdy
one, he hefted my girl safe out of the way of harm when some mad horsemen in a
hurry all but rode us down into the ditch, and he carried our bundles for her
after, for she was well loaded, I being busy helping Rhun along. Truth to tell,
I think the young man was taken with our Melangell, for he was very attentive
to her once we joined company. More than to his friend, though indeed he never
stirred a step away from him. A vow is a vow, I suppose, and if a man’s taken
all that suffering on himself of his own will, what can another do to prevent
it? No more than bear him company, and that the lad is doing, faithfully, for
he never leaves him.” She was out of the door and spreading
appreciative nostrils for the scent of the sunlit herbs, when she looked back
to add: “There’s others among them may call themselves pilgrims as loud and
often as they will, but I wouldn’t trust one or two of them as far as I could
throw them. I suppose rogues will make their way everywhere, even among the
saints.” “As long as the saints have money in their
purses, or anything about them worth stealing,” agreed Cadfael wryly, “rogues
will never be far away.” Whether Mistress Weaver did speak to her
strange travelling companion or not, it was he who arrived at Cadfael’s
workshop within half an hour, before ever the boy Rhun showed his face. Cadfael
was back at his weeding when he heard them come, or heard, rather, the slow,
patient footsteps of the sturdy one stirring the gravel of his pathways. The
other made no sound in walking, for he stepped tenderly and carefully in the
grass border, which was cool and kind to his misused feet. If there was any
sound to betray his coming it was the long, effortful sighing of his breath,
the faint, indrawn hiss of pain. As soon as Cadfael straightened his back and
turned his head, he knew who came. They were much of an age, and even
somewhat alike in build and colouring, above middle height but that the one
stooped in his laboured progress, brown-haired and dark of eye, and perhaps
twenty-five or twenty-six years old. Yet not so like that they could have been
brothers or close kin. The hale one had the darker complexion, as though he had
been more in the air and the sun, and broader bones of cheek and jaw, a
stubborn, proud, secret face, disconcertingly still, confiding nothing. The
sufferer’s face was long, mobile and passionate, with high cheekbones and
hollow cheeks beneath them, and a mouth tight-drawn, either with present pain
or constant passion. Anger might be one of his customary companions, burning
ardour another. The young man Matthew stalked at his heels mute and jealously
watchful in attendance on him. Mindful of Mistress Weaver’s loquacious
confidences, Cadfael looked from the scarred and swollen feet to the chafed
neck. Within the collar of his plain dark coat the votary had wound a length of
linen cloth, to alleviate the rubbing of the thin cord from which a heavy cross
of iron, chaced in a leaf pattern with what looked like gold, hung down upon
his breast. By the look of the seam of red that marked the linen, either this
padding was new, or else it had not been effective. The cord was mercilessly
thin, the cross certainly heavy. To what desperate end could a young man choose
so to torture himself? And what pleasure did he think it could give to God or
Saint Winifred to contemplate his discomfort? Eyes feverishly bright scanned him. A low
voice asked: “You are Brother Cadfael? That is the name Brother Hospitaller
gave me. He said you would have ointments and salves that could be of help to
me. So far,” he added, eyeing Cadfael with glittering fixity, “as there is any
help anywhere for me.” Cadfael gave him a considering look for
that, but asked nothing until he had marshalled the pair of them into his
workshop and sat the sufferer down to be inspected with due care. The young man
Matthew took up his stand beside the open door, careful to avoid blocking the
light, but would not come further within. “You’ve come a fairish step unshod,” said
Cadfael, on his knees to examine the damage. “Was such cruelty needful?” “It was. I do not hate myself so much as
to bear this to no purpose.” The silent youth by the door stirred slightly, but
said no word. “I am under vow,” said his companion, “and will not break it.” It
seemed that he felt a need to account for himself, forestalling questioning.
“My name is Ciaran, I am of a Welsh mother, and I am going back to where I was
born, there to end my life as I began it. You see the wounds on my feet,
brother, but what most ails me does not show anywhere upon me. I have a fell
disease, no threat to any other, but it must shortly end me.” And it could be true, thought Cadfael,
busy with a cleansing oil on the swollen soles, and the toes cut by gravel and
stones. The feverish fire of the deep-set eyes might well mean an even fiercer
fire within. True, the young body, now eased in repose, was well-made and had
not lost flesh, but that was no sure proof of health. Ciaran’s voice remained
low, level and firm. If he knew he had his death, he had come to terms with it. “So I am returning in penitential
pilgrimage, for my soul’s health, which is of greater import. Barefoot and
burdened I shall walk to the house of canons at Aberdaron, so that after my
death I may be buried on the holy isle of Ynys Enlli, where the soil is made up
of the bones and dust of thousands upon thousands of saints.” “I should have thought,” said Cadfael
mildly, “that such a privilege could be earned by going there shod and tranquil
and humble, like any other man.” But for all that, it was an understandable
ambition for a devout man of Welsh extraction, knowing his end near. Aberdaron,
at the tip of the Lleyn peninsula, fronting the wild sea and the holiest island
of the Welsh church, had been the last resting place of many, and the
hospitality of the canons of the house was never refused to any man. “I would
not cast doubt on your sacrifice, but self-imposed suffering seems to me a kind
of arrogance, and not humility.” “It may be so,” said Ciaran remotely. “No
help for it now, I am bound.” “That is true,” said Matthew from his
corner by the door. A measured and yet an abrupt voice, deeper than his
companion’s. “Fast bound! So are we both, I no less than he.” “Hardly by the same vows,” said Cadfael
drily. For Matthew wore good, solid shoes, a little down at heel, but proof
against the stones of the road. “No, not the same. But no less binding.
And I do not forget mine, any more than he forgets his.” Cadfael laid down the foot he had
anointed, setting a folded cloth under it, and lifted its fellow into his lap.
“God forbid I should tempt any man to break his oath. You will both do as you
must do. But at least you may rest your feet here until after the feast, which
will give you three days for healing, and here within the pale the ground is
not so harsh. And once healed, I have a rough spirit that will help to harden
your soles for when you take to the road again. Why not, unless you have
forsworn all help from men? And since you came to me, I take it you have not
yet gone so far. There, sit a while longer, and let that dry.” He rose from his knees, surveying his work
critically, and turned his attention next to the linen wrapping about Ciaran’s
neck. He laid both hands gently on the cord by which the cross depended, and
made to lift it over the young man’s head. “No, no, let be!” It was a soft, wild cry
of alarm, and Ciaran clutched at cross and cord, one with either hand, and
hugged his burden to him fiercely. “Don’t touch it! Let it be!” “Surely,” said Cadfael, startled, “you may
lift it off while I dress the wound it’s cost you? Hardly a moment’s work, why
not?” “No!” Ciaran fastened both hands upon the
cross and hugged it to his breast. “No, never for a moment, night or day! No!
Let it alone!” “Lift it, then,” said Cadfael resignedly,
“and hold it while I dress this cut. No, never fear, I’ll not cheat you. Only
let me unwind this cloth, and see what damage you have there, hidden.” “Yet he should doff it, and so I have
prayed him constantly,” said Matthew softly. “How else can he be truly rid of
his pains?” Cadfael unwound the linen, viewed the
scored line of half-dried blood, still oozing, and went to work on it with a
stinging lotion first to clean it of dust and fragments of frayed skin, and
then with a healing ointment of cleavers. He refolded the cloth, and wound it
carefully under the cord. “There, you have not broken faith. Settle your load
again. If you hold up the weight in your hands as you go, and loosen it in your
bed, you’ll be rid of your gash before you depart.” It seemed to him that they were both of
them in haste to leave him, for the one set his feet tenderly to ground as soon
as he was released, holding up the weight of his cross obediently with both
hands, and the other stepped out through the doorway into the sunlit garden,
and waited on guard for his friend to emerge. The one owed no special thanks,
the other offered only the merest acknowledgement. “But I would remind you both,” said
Cadfael, and with a thoughtful eye on both, “that you are now present at the
feast of a saint who has worked many miracles, even to the defiance of death.
One who may have life itself within her gift,” he said strongly, “even for a
man already condemned to death. Bear it in mind, for she may be listening now!” They said never a word, neither did they
look at each other. They stared back at him from the scented brightness of the
garden with startled, wary eyes, and then they turned abruptly as one man, and
limped and strode away. Chapter Four THERE WAS SO SHORT an interval, and so
little weeding done, before the second pair appeared, that Cadfael could not
choose but reason that the two couples must have met at the corner of his
herber, and perhaps exchanged at least a friendly word or two, since they had
travelled side by side the last miles of their road here. The girl walked solicitously beside her
brother, giving him the smoothest part of the path, and keeping a hand
supportingly under his left elbow, ready to prop him at need, but barely
touching. Her face was turned constantly towards him, eager and loving. If he
was the tended darling, and she the healthy beast of burden, certainly she had
no quarrel with the division. Though just once she did look back over her shoulder,
with a different, a more tentative smile. She was neat and plain in her
homespun country dress, her hair austerely braided, but her face was vivid and
glowing as a rose, and her movements, even at her brother’s pace, had a spring
and grace to them that spoke of a high and ardent spirit. She was fair for a
Welsh girl, her hair a coppery gold, her brows darker, arched hopefully above
wide blue eyes. Mistress Weaver could not be far out in supposing that a young
man who had hefted this neat little woman out of harm’s way in his arms might
well remember the experience with pleasure, and not be averse to repeating it.
If he could take his eyes from his fellow-pilgrim long enough to attempt it! The boy came leaning heavily on his
crutches, his right leg dangling inertly, turned with the toe twisted inward,
and barely brushing the ground. If he could have stood erect he would have been
a hand’s-breadth taller than his sister, but thus hunched he looked even
shorter. Yet the young body was beautifully proportioned, Cadfael judged,
watching his approach with a thoughtful eye, wide-shouldered, slim-flanked, the
one good leg long, vigorous and shapely. He carried little flesh, indeed he
could have done with more, but if he spent his days habitually in pain it was
unlikely he had much appetite. Cadfael’s study of him had begun at the
twisted foot, and travelling upward, came last to the boy’s face. He was fairer
than the girl, wheat-gold of hair and brows, his thin, smooth face like ivory,
and the eyes that met Cadfael’s were a light, brilliant grey-blue, clear as
crystal between long, dark lashes. It was a very still and tranquil face, one
that had learned patient endurance, and expected to have need of it lifelong.
It was clear to Cadfael, in that first exchange of glances, that Rhun did not
look for any miraculous deliverance, whatever Mistress Weaver’s hopes might be. “If you please,” said the girl shyly, “I
have brought my brother, as my aunt said I should. And his name is Rhun, and
mine is Melangell.” “She has told me about you,” said Cadfael,
beckoning them with him towards his workshop. “A long journey you’ve had of it.
Come within, and let’s make you as easy as we may, while I take a look at this
leg of yours. Was there ever an injury brought this on? A fall, or a kick from
a horse? Or a bout of the bone-fever?” He settled the boy on the long bench,
took the crutches from him and laid them aside, and turned him so that he could
stretch out his legs at rest. The boy, with grave eyes steady on
Cadfael’s face, slowly shook his head. “No such accident,” he said in a man’s
low, clear voice. “It came. I think, slowly, but I don’t remember a time before
it. They say I began to falter and fall when I was three or four years old.” Melangell, hesitant in the doorway—strangely
like Ciaran’s attendant shadow, thought Cadfael—had her chin on her shoulder
now, and turned almost hastily to say: “Rhun will tell you all his case. He’ll
be better private with you. I’ll come back later, and wait on the seat outside
there until you need me.” Rhun’s light, bright eyes, transparent as
sunlit ice, smiled at her warmly over Cadfael’s shoulder. “Do go,” he said. “So
fine and sunny a day, you should make good use of it, without me dangling about
you.” She gave him a long, anxious glance, but
half her mind was already away; and satisfied that he was in good hands, she
made her hasty reverence, and fled. They were left looking at each other,
strangers still, and yet in tentative touch. “She goes to find Matthew,” said Rhun
simply, confident of being understood. “He was good to her. And to me,
also—once he carried me the last piece of the way to our night’s lodging on his
back. She likes him, and he would like her, if he could truly see her, but he
seldom sees anyone but Ciaran.” This blunt simplicity might well get him
the reputation of an innocent, though that would be the world’s mistake. What
he saw, he said—provided, Cadfael hoped, he had already taken the measure of
the person to whom he spoke—and he saw more than most, having so much more need
to observe and record, to fill up the hours of his day. “They were here?” asked Rhun, shifting
obediently to allow Cadfael to strip down the long hose from his hips and his
maimed leg. “They were here. Yes, I know.” “I would like her to be happy.” “She has it in her to be very happy,” said
Cadfael, answering in kind, almost without his will. The boy had a quality of
dazzle about him that made unstudied answers natural, almost inevitable. There
had been, he thought, the slightest of stresses on ‘her’. Rhun had little
enough expectation that he could ever be happy, but he wanted happiness for his
sister. “Now pay heed,” said Cadfael, bending to his own duties, “for this is
important. Close your eyes, and be at ease as far as you can, and tell me where
I find a spot that gives pain. First, thus at rest, is there any pain now?” Docilely Rhun closed his eyes and waited,
breathing softly. “No, I am quite easy now.” Good, for all his sinews lay loose and
trustful, and at least in that state he felt no pain. Cadfael began to finger
his way, at first very gently and soothingly, all down the thigh and calf of
the helpless leg, probing and manipulating. Thus stretched out at rest, the
twisted limb partially regained its proper alignment, and showed fairly formed,
though much wasted by comparison with the left, and marred by the intumed toe
and certain tight, bunched knots of sinew in the calf. He sought out these, and
let his fingers dig deep there, wrestling with hard tissue. “There I feel it,” said Rhun, breathing
deep. “It doesn’t feel like pain—yes, it hurts, but not for crying. A good
hurt…” Brother Cadfael oiled his hands, smoothed
a palm over the shrunken calf, and went to work with firm fingertips, working
tendons unexercised for years, beyond that tensed touch of toe upon ground. He
was gentle and slow, feeling for the hard cores of resistance. There were
unnatural tensions there, that would not melt to him yet. He let his fingers
work softly, and his mind probe elsewhere. “You were orphaned early. How long have
you been with your Aunt Weaver?” “Seven years now,” said Rhun almost
drowsily, soothed by the circling fingers. “I know we are a burden to her, but
she never says it, nor she would never let any other say it. She has a good
business, but small, it provides her needs and keeps two men at work, but she
is not rich. Melangell works hard keeping the house and the kitchen, and earns
her keep. I have learned to weave, but I am slow at it. I can neither stand for
long nor sit for long, I am no profit to her. But she never speaks of it, for
all she has an edge to her tongue when she pleases.” “She would,” agreed Cadfael peacefully. “A
woman with many cares is liable to be short in her speech now and again, and no
ill meant. She has brought you here for a miracle. You know that? Why else
would you all three have walked all this way, measuring out the stages day by
day at your pace? And yet I think you have no expectation of grace. Do you not
believe Saint Winifred can do wonders?” “I?” The boy was startled, he opened great
eyes clearer than the clear waters Cadfael had navigated long ago, in the
eastern fringes of the Midland Sea, over pale and glittering sand. “Oh, you
mistake me, I do believe. But why for me? In case like mine we come by our
thousands, in worse case by the hundred. How dare I ask to be among the first?
Besides, what I have I can bear. There are some who cannot bear what they have.
The saint will know where to choose. There is no reason her choice should fall
on me.” “Then why did you consent to come?”
Cadfael asked. Rhun turned his head aside, and eyelids
blue-veined like the petals of anemones veiled his eyes. “They wished it, I did
what they wanted. And there was Melangell…” Yes, Melangell who was altogether comely
and bright and a charm to the eye, thought Cadfael. Her brother knew her
dowryless, and wished her a little of joy and a decent marriage, and there at
home, working hard in house and kitchen, and known for a penniless niece,
suitors there were none. A venture so far upon the roads, to mingle with so
various a company, might bring forth who could tell what chances? In moving Rhun had plucked at a nerve that
gripped and twisted him, he eased himself back against the timber wall with
aching care. Cadfael drew up the homespun hose over the boy’s nakedness,
knotted him decent, and gently drew down his feet, the sound and the crippled,
to the beaten earth floor. “Come again to me tomorrow, after High
Mass, for I think I can help you, if only a little. Now sit until I see if that
sister of yours is waiting, and if not, you may rest easy until she comes. And
I’ll give you a single draught to take this night when you go to your bed. It
will ease your pain and help you to sleep.” The girl was there, still and solitary
against the sun-warmed wall, the brightness of her face clouded over, as though
some eager expectation had turned into a grey disappointment; but at the sight
of Rhun emerging she rose with a resolute smile for him, and her voice was as
gay and heartening as ever as they moved slowly away. He had an opportunity to study all of them
next day at High Mass, when doubtless his mind should have been on higher
things, but obstinately would not rise above the quivering crest of Mistress
Weaver’s head-cloth, and the curly dark crown of Matthew’s thick crop of hair.
Almost all the inhabitants of the guest-halls, the gentles who had separate
apartments as well as the male and female pilgrims who shared the two common
dortoirs, came in their best to this one office of the day, whatever they did with
the rest of it. Mistress Weaver paid devout attention to every word of the
office, and several times nudged Melangell sharply in the ribs to recall her to
duty, for as often as not her head was turned sidewise, and her gaze directed
rather at Matthew than at the altar. No question but her fancy, if not her
whole heart, was deeply engaged there. As for Matthew, he stood at Ciaran’s
shoulder, always within touch. But twice at least he looked round, and his
brooding eyes rested, with no change of countenance, upon Melangell. Yet on the
one occasion when their glances met, it was Matthew who turned abruptly away. That young man, thought Cadfael, aware of
the broken encounter of eyes, has a thing to do which no girl must be allowed
to hinder or spoil: to get his fellow safely to his journey’s end at Aberdaron. He was already a celebrated figure in the
enclave, this Ciaran. There was nothing secret about him, he spoke freely and
humbly of himself. He had been intended for ordination, but had not yet gone
beyond the first step as sub-deacon, and had not reached, and now never would
reach, the tonsure. Brother Jerome, always a man to insinuate himself as close
as might be to any sign of superlative virtue and holiness, had cultivated and
questioned him, and freely retailed what he had learned to any of the brothers
who would listen. The story of Ciaran’s mortal sickness and penitential
pilgrimage home to Aberdaron was known to all. The austerities he practised
upon himself made a great impression. Brother Jerome held that the house was
honoured in receiving such a man. And indeed that lean, passionate face,
burning-eyed beneath the uncropped brown hair, had a vehement force and
fervour. Rhun could not kneel, but stood steady and
stoical on his crutches throughout the office, his eyes fixed, wide and bright,
upon the altar. In this soft, dim light within, already reflecting from every
stone surface the muted brightness of a cloudless day outside, Cadfael saw that
the boy was beautiful, the planes of his face as suave and graceful as any
girl’s, the curving of his fair hair round ears and cheeks angelically pure and
chaste. If the woman with no son of her own doted on him, and was willing to
forsake her living for a matter of weeks on the off-chance of a miracle that would
heal him, who could wonder at her? Since both his attention and his eyes were
straying, Cadfael gave up the struggle and let them stray at large over all
those devout heads, gathered in a close assembly and filling the nave of the
church. An important pilgrimage has much of the atmosphere of a public fair
about it, and brings along with it all the hangers-on who frequent such
occasions, the pickpockets, the plausible salesmen of relics, sweetmeats,
remedies, the fortune-tellers, the gamblers, the swindlers and cheats of all
kinds. And some of these cultivate the most respectable of appearances, and
prefer to work from within the pale rather than set up in the Foregate as at a
market. It was always worth running an eye over the ranks within, as Hugh’s sergeants
were certainly doing along the ranks without, to mark down probable sources of
trouble before ever the trouble began. This congregation certainly looked
precisely what it purported to be. Nevertheless, there were a few there worth a
second glance. Three modest, unobtrusive tradesmen who had arrived closely one
after another and rapidly and openly made acquaintance, to all appearances
until then strangers: Walter Bagot, glover; John Shure, tailor; William Hales,
farrier. Small craftsmen making this their summer holiday, and modestly out to
enjoy it. And why not? Except that Cadfael had noted the tailor’s hands
devoutly folded, and observed that he cultivated the long, well-tended nails of
a fairground sharper, hardly suitable for a tailor’s work. He made a mental
note of their faces, the glover rounded and glossy, as if oiled with the same
dressing he used on his leathers, the tailor lean-jowled and sedate, with lank
hair curtaining a lugubrious face, the farrier square, brown and twinkling of
eye, the picture of honest good-humour. They might be what they claimed. They
might not. Hugh would be on the watch, so would the careful tavern-keepers of
the Foregate and the town, by no means eager to hold their doors open to the
fleecers and skinners of their own neighbours and customers. Cadfael went out from Mass with his
brethren, very thoughtful, and found Rhun already waiting for him in the
herbarium. The boy sat passive and submitted himself
to Cadfael’s handling, saying no word beyond his respectful greeting. The
rhythm of the questing fingers, patiently coaxing apart the rigid tissues that
lamed him, had a soothing effect, even when they probed deeply enough to cause
pain. He let his head lean back against the timbers of the wall, and his eyes
gradually closed. The tension of his cheeks and lips showed that he was not
sleeping, but Cadfael was able to study the boy’s face closely as he worked on
him, and note his pallor, and the dark rings round his eyes. “Well, did you take the dose I gave you
for the night?” asked Cadfael, guessing at the answer. “No.” Rhun opened his eyes apprehensively,
to see if he was to be reproved for it, but Cadfael’s face showed neither
surprise nor reproach. “Why not?” “I don’t know. Suddenly I felt there was
no need. I was happy,” said Rhun, his eyes again closed, the better to examine
his own actions and motives. “I had prayed. It’s not that I doubt the saint’s
power. Suddenly it seemed to me that I need not even wish to be healed… that I
ought to offer up my lameness and pain freely, not as a price for favour.
People bring offerings, and I have nothing else to offer. Do you think it might
be acceptable? I meant it humbly.” There could hardly be, thought Cadfael,
among all her devotees, a more costly oblation. He has gone far along a
difficult road who has come to the point of seeing that deprivation, pain and
disability are of no consequence at all, beside the inward conviction of grace,
and the secret peace of the soul. An acceptance which can only be made for a
man’s own self, never for any other. Another’s grief is not to be tolerated, if
there can be anything done to alleviate it. “And did you sleep well?” “No. But it didn’t matter. I lay quiet all
night long. I tried to bear it gladly. And I was not the only one there wakeful.”
He slept in the common dormitory for the men, and there must be several among
his fellows there afflicted in one way or another, besides the sick and
possibly contagious whom Brother Edmund had isolated in the infirmary. “Ciaran
was restless, too,” said Rhun reflectively, “When it was all silent, after
Lauds, he got up very quietly from his cot, trying not to disturb anyone, and
started wards the door. I thought then how strange it was that he took his belt
and scrip with him…” Cadfael was listening intently enough by
this time. Why, indeed, if a man merely needed relief for his body during the
night, should he burden himself with carrying his possessions about with him?
Though the habit of being wary of theft, in such shared accommodation, might
persist even when half-asleep, and in monastic care into the bargain. “Did he so, indeed? And what followed?” “Matthew has his own pallet drawn close
beside Ciaran’s, even in the night he lies with a hand stretched out to touch.
Besides, you know, he seems to know by instinct whatever ails Ciaran. He rose
up in an instant, and reached out and took Ciaran by the arm. And Ciaran
started and gasped, and blinked round at him, like a man startled awake
suddenly, and whispered that he’d been asleep and dreaming, and had dreamed it
was time to start out on the road again. So then Matthew took the scrip from
him and laid it aside, and they both lay down in their beds again, and all was
quiet as before. But I don’t think Ciaran slept well, even after that, his
dream had disturbed his mind too much, I heard him twisting and turning for a
long time.” “Did they know,” asked Cadfael, “that you
were also awake, and had heard what passed?” “I can’t tell. I made no pretence, and the
pain was bad, I think they must have heard me shifting… I couldn’t help it. But
of course I made no sign, it would have been discourteous.” So it passed as a dream, perhaps for the
benefit of Rhun, or any other who might be wakeful as he was. True enough, a
sick man troubled by night might very well rise by stealth to leave his friend
in peace, out of consideration. But then, if he needed ease, he would have been
forced to explain himself and go, when his friend nevertheless started awake to
restrain him. Instead, he had pleaded a deluding dream, and lain down again.
And men rousing in dreams do move silently, almost as if by stealth. It could
be, it must be, simply what it seemed. “You travelled some miles of the way with
those two, Rhun. How did you all fare together on the road? You must have got
to know them as well as any here.” “It was their being slow, like us, that
kept us all together, after my sister was nearly ridden down, and Matthew ran
and caught her up and leaped the ditch with her. They were just slowly
overtaking us then, after that we went on all together for company. But I
wouldn’t say we got to know them—they are so rapt in each other. And then,
Ciaran was in pain, and that kept him silent, though he did tell us where he
was bound, and why. It’s true Melangell and Matthew took to walking last,
behind us, and he carried our few goods for her, having so little of his own to
carry. I never wondered at Ciaran being so silent,” said Rhun simply, “seeing
what he had to bear. And my Aunt Alice can talk for two,” he ended guilelessly. So she could, and no doubt did, all the
rest of the way into Shrewsbury. “That pair, Ciaran and Matthew,” said
Cadfael, still delicately probing, “they never told you how they came together?
Whether they were kin, or friends, or had simply met and kept company on the road?
For they’re much of an age, even of a kind, young men of some schooling, I
fancy, bred to clerking or squiring, and yet not kin, or don’t acknowledge it,
and after their fashion very differently made. A man wonders how they ever came
to be embarked together on this journey. It was south of Warwick when you met
them? I wonder from how far south they came.” “They never spoke of such things,” owned
Rhun, himself considering them for the first time. “It was good to have company
on the way, one stout young man at least. The roads can be perilous for two
women, with only a cripple like me. But now you speak of it, no, we did not
learn much of where they came from, or what bound them together. Unless my
sister knows more. There were days,” said Rhun, shifting to assist Brother
Cadfael’s probings into the sinews of his thigh, “when she and Matthew grew
quite easy and talkative behind us.” Cadfael doubted whether the subject of
their conversation then had been anything but their two selves, brushing
sleeves pleasurably along the summer highways, she in constant recall of the
moment when she was snatched up bodily and swung across the ditch against
Matthew’s heart, he in constant contemplation of the delectable creature
dancing at his elbow, and recollection of the feel of her slight, warm,
frightened weight on his breast. “But he’ll hardly look at her now,” said
Rhun regretfully. “He’s too intent on Ciaran, and Melangell will come between.
But it costs him a dear effort to turn away from her, all the same.” Cadfael stroked down the misshapen leg,
and rose to scrub his oily hands. “There, that’s enough for today. But sit
quiet a while and rest before you go. And will you take the draught tonight? At
least keep it by you, and do what you feel to be right and best. But remember
it’s a kindness sometimes to accept help, a kindness to the giver. Would you
wilfully inflict torment on yourself as Ciaran does? No, not you, you are too
modest by far to set yourself up for braver and more to be worshipped than
other men. So never think you do wrong by sparing yourself discomfort. Yet it’s
your choice, make it as you see fit.” When the boy took up his crutches again
and tapped his way out along the path towards the great court, Cadfael followed
him at a distance, to watch his progress without embarrassing him. He could
mark no change as yet. The stretched toe still barely dared touch ground, and
still turned inward. And yet the sinews, cramped as they were, had some small
force in them, instead of being withered and atrophied as he would have
expected. If I had him here long enough, he thought, I could bring back some
ease and use into that leg. But he’ll go as he came. In three days now all will
be over, the festival ended for this year, the guest-hall emptying. Ciaran and
his guardian shadow will pass on northwards and westwards into Wales, and Dame
Weaver will take her chicks back home to Campden. And those two, who might very
well have made a fair match if things had been otherwise, will go their
separate ways, and never see each other again. It’s in the nature of things
that those who gather in great numbers for the feasts of the church should also
disperse again to their various duties afterwards. Still, they need not all go
away unchanged. Chapter Five BROTHER ADAM OF READING, being lodged in
the dortoir with the monks of the house, had had leisure to observe his fellow
pilgrims of the guest-hall only at the offices of the church, and in their
casual comings and goings about the precinct; and it happened that he came from
the garden towards midafternoon, with Cadfael beside him, just as Ciaran and
Matthew were crossing the court towards the cloister garth, there to sit in the
sun for an hour or two before Vespers. There were plenty of others, monks, lay
servants and guests, busy on their various occasions, but Ciaran’s striking
figure and painfully slow and careful gait marked him out for notice. “Those two,” said Brother Adam, halting,
“I have seen before. At Abington, where I spent the first night after leaving
Reading. They were lodged there the same night.” “At Abingdon!” Cadfael echoed
thoughtfully. “So they came from far south. You did not cross them again after
Abingdon, on the way here?” “It was not likely. I was mounted. And
then, I had my abbot’s mission to Leominster, which took me out of the direct
way. No, I saw no more of them, never until now. But they can hardly be
mistaken, once seen.” “In what sort of case were they at
Abingdon?” asked Cadfael, his eyes following the two inseparable figures until
they vanished into the cloister. “Would you say they had been long on the road
before that night’s halt? The man is pledged to go barefoot to Aberdaron, it
would not take many miles to leave the mark on him.” “He was going somewhat lamely, even then.
They had both the dust of the roads on them. It might have been their first
day’s walking that ended there, but I doubt it.” “He came to me to have his feet tended,
yesterday,” said Cadfael, “and I must see him again before evening. Two or
three days of rest will set him up for the next stage of his walk. From more
than a day’s going south of Abingdon to the remotest tip of Wales, a long, long
walk. A strange, even a mistaken, piety it seems to me, to take upon oneself
ostentatious pains, when there are poor fellows enough in the world who are
born to pain they have not chosen, and carry it with humility.” “The simple believe it brings merit,” said
Brother Adam tolerantly. “It may be he has no other claim upon outstanding
virtue, and clutches at this.” “But he’s no simple soul,” said Cadfael
with conviction, “whatever he may be. He has, he tells me, a mortal disease,
and is going to end his days in blessedness and peace at Aberdaron, and have
his bones laid in Ynys Enlli, which is a noble ambition in a man of Welsh
blood. The voluntary assumption of pain beyond his doom may even be a pennon of
defiance, a wag of the hand against death. That I could understand. But I would
not approve it.” “It’s very natural you should frown on
it,” agreed Adam, smiling indulgence upon his companion and himself alike,
“seeing you are schooled to the alleviation of pain, and feel it to be a
violator and an enemy. By the very virtue of these plants we have learned to
use.” He patted the leather scrip at his girdle, and the soft rustle of seeds
within answered him. They had been sorting over Cadfael’s clay saucers of new
seed from this freshly ripening year, and he had helped himself to two or three
not native in his own herbarium. “It is as good a dragon to fight as any in
this world, pain.” They had gone some yards more towards the
stone steps that led up to the main door of the guest-hall, in no hurry, and
taking pleasure in the contemplation of so much bustle and motion, when Brother
Adam checked abruptly and stood at gaze. “Well, well, I think you may have got some
of our southern sinners, as well as our would-be saints!” Cadfael, surprised, followed where Adam
was gazing, and stood to hear what further he would have to say, for the
individual in question was the least remarkable of men at first glance. He
stood close to the gatehouse, one of a small group constantly on hand there to
watch the new arrivals and the general commerce of the day. A big man, but so
neatly and squarely built that his size was not wholly apparent, he stood with
his thumbs in the belt of his plain but ample gown, which was nicely cut and
fashioned to show him no nobleman, and no commoner, either, but a solid,
respectable, comfortably provided fellow of the middle kind, merchant or
tradesman. One of those who form the backbone of many a township in England,
and can afford the occasional pilgrimage by way of a well-earned holiday. He
gazed benignly upon the activity around him from a plump, shrewd, well-shaven
face, favouring the whole creation with a broad, contented smile. “That,” said Cadfael, eyeing his companion
with bright enquiry, “is, or so I am informed, one Simeon Poer, a merchant of
Guildford, come on pilgrimage for his soul’s sake, and because the summer
chances to be very fine and inviting. And why not? Do you know of a reason?” “Simeon Poer may well be his name,” said
Brother Adam, “or he may have half a dozen more ready to trot forward at need.
I never knew a name for him, but his face and form I do know. Father Abbot uses
me a good deal on his business outside the cloister and I have occasion to know
most of the fairs and markets in our shire and beyond. I’ve seen that
fellow—not gowned like a provost, as he is now, I grant you, but by the look of
him he’s been doing well lately—round every fairground, cultivating the company
of those young, green roisterers who frequent every such gathering. For the
contents of their pockets, surely. Most likely, dice. Even more likely, loaded
dice. Though I wouldn’t say he might not pick a pocket here and there, if
business was bad. A quicker means to the same end, if a riskier.” So knowing and practical a brother Cadfael
had not encountered for some years among the innocents. Plainly Brother Adam’s
frequent sallies out of the cloister on the abbot’s business had broadened his
horizons. Cadfael regarded him with respect and warmth, and turned to study the
smiling, benevolent merchant more closely. “You’re sure of him?” “Sure that he’s the same man, yes. Sure
enough of his practices to challenge him openly, no, hardly, since he has never
yet been taken up but once, and then he proved so slippery he slithered through
the bailiffs fingers. But keep a weather eye on him, and this may be where
he’ll make the slip every rogue makes in the end, and get his comeuppance.” “If you’re right,” said Cadfael, “has he
not strayed rather far from his own haunts? In my experience, from years back I
own, his kind seldom left the region where they knew their way about better
than the bailiffs. Has he made the south country so hot for him that he must run
for a fresh territory? That argues something worse than cheating at dice.” Brother Adam hoisted dubious shoulders.
“It could be. Some of our scum have found the disorders of faction very
profitable, in their own way, just as their lords and masters have in theirs.
Battles are not for them—far too dangerous to their own skins. But the brawls
that blow up in towns where uneasy factions come together are meat and drink to
them. Pockets to be picked, riots to be started—discreetly from the
rear—unoffending elders who look prosperous to be knocked on the head or knifed
from behind or have their purse-strings cut in the confusion… Safer and easier
than taking to the woods and living wild for prey, as their kind do in the
country.” Just such gatherings, thought Cadfael, as
that at Winchester, where at least one man was knifed in the back and left
dying. Might not the law in the south be searching for this man, to drive him
so far from his usual hunting-grounds? For some worse offence than cheating
silly young men of their money at dice? Something as black as murder itself? “There are two or three others in the
common guest-hall,” he said, “about whom I have my doubts, but this man has had
no truck with them so far as I’ve seen. But I’ll bear it in mind, and keep a watchful
eye open, and have Brother Denis do the same. And I’ll mention what you say to
Hugh Beringar, too, before this evening’s out. Both he and the town provost
will be glad to have fair warning.” Since Ciaran was sitting quietly in the
cloister garth, it seemed a pity he should be made to walk through the gardens
to the herbarium, when Cadfael’s broad brown feet were in excellent condition,
and sensibly equipped with stout sandals. So Cadfael fetched the salve he had
used on Ciaran’s wounds and bruises, and the spirit that would brace and
toughen his tender soles, and brought them to the cloister. It was pleasant
there in the afternoon sun, and the turf was thick and springy and cool to bare
feet. The roses were coming into full bloom, and their scent hung in the warm
air like a benediction. But two such closed and sunless faces! Was the one
truly condemned to an early death, and the other to lose and mourn so close a
friend? Ciaran was speaking as Cadfael approached,
and did not at first notice him, but even when he was aware of the visitor
bearing down on them he continued steadily to the end, “… you do but waste your
time, for it will not happen. Nothing will be changed, don’t look for it.
Never! You might far better leave me and go home.” Did the one of them believe in Saint
Winifred’s power, and pray and hope for a miracle? And was the other, the sick
man, all too passionately of Rhun’s mind, and set on offering his early death
as an acceptable and willing sacrifice, rather than ask for healing? Matthew had not yet noticed Cadfael’s
approach. His deep voice, measured and resolute, said just audibly, “Save your
breath! For I will go with you, step for step, to the very end.” Then Cadfael was close, and they were both
aware of him, and stirred defensively out of their private anguish, heaving in
breath and schooling their faces to confront the outer world decently. They
drew a little apart on the stone bench, welcoming Cadfael with somewhat
strained smiles. “I saw no need to make you come to me,”
said Cadfael, dropping to his knees and opening his scrip in the bright green
turf, “when I am better able to come to you. So sit and be easy, and let me see
how much work is yet to be done before you can go forth in good heart.” “This is kind, brother,” said Ciaran,
rousing himself with a sigh. “Be assured that I do go in good heart, for my
pilgrimage is short and my arrival assured.” At the other end of the bench Matthew’s
voice said softly, “Amen!” After that it was all silence as Cadfael
anointed the swollen soles, kneading spirit vigorously into the misused skin,
surely heretofore accustomed always to going well shod, and soothed the
ointment of cleavers into the healing grazes. “There! Keep off your feet through
tomorrow, but for such offices as you feel you must attend. Here there’s no
need to go far. And I’ll come to you tomorrow and have you fit to stand
somewhat longer the next day, when the saint is brought home.” When he spoke of
her now, he hardly knew whether he was truly speaking of the mortal substance
of Saint Winifred, which was generally believed to be in that silver-chaced
reliquary, or of some hopeful distillation of her spirit which could fill with
sanctity even an empty coffin, even a casket containing pitiful, faulty human
bones, unworthy of her charity, but subject, like all mortality, to the
capricious, smiling mercies of those above and beyond question. If you could
reason by pure logic for the occurrence of miracles, they would not be
miracles, would they? He scrubbed his hands on a handful of
wool, and rose from his knees. In some twenty minutes or so it would be time
for Vespers. He had taken his leave, and almost reached
the archway into the great court, when he heard rapid steps at his heels, a
hand reached deprecatingly for his sleeve, and Matthew’s voice said in his ear,
“Brother Cadfael, you left this lying.” It was his jar of ointment, of rough,
greenish pottery, almost invisible in the grass. The young man held it out in
the palm of a broad, strong, workmanlike hand, long-fingered and elegant. Dark
eyes, reserved but earnestly curious, searched Cadfael’s face. Cadfael took the jar with thanks, and put
it away in his scrip. Ciaran sat where Matthew had left him, his face and
burning gaze turned towards them; they stood at a distance, between him and the
outer day, and he had, for one moment, the look of a soul abandoned to absolute
solitude in a populous world. Cadfael and Matthew stood gazing in
speculation and uncertainty into each other’s eyes. This was that able, ready
young man who had leaped into action at need, upon whom Melangell had fixed her
young, unpractised heart, and to whom Rhun had surely looked for a hopeful way
out for his sister, whatever might become of himself. Good, cultivated stock,
surely, bred of some small gentry and taught a little Latin as well as his
schooling in arms. How, except by the compulsion of inordinate love, did this
one come to be ranging the country like a penniless vagabond, without root or
attachment but to a dying man? “Tell me truth,” said Cadfael. “Is it
indeed true—is it certain—that Ciaran goes this way towards his death?” There was a brief moment of silence, as
Matthew’s wide-set eyes grew larger and darker. Then he said very softly and
deliberately, “It is truth. He is already marked for death. Unless your saint
has a miracle for us, there is nothing can save him. Or me!” he ended abruptly,
and wrenched himself away to return to his devoted watch. Cadfael turned his back on supper in the
refectory, and set off instead along the Foregate towards the town. Over the
bridge that spanned the Severn, in through the gate, and up the curving slope
of the Wyle to Hugh Beringar’s town house. There he sat and nursed his godson
Giles, a large, comely, self-willed child, fair like his mother, and long of limb,
some day to dwarf his small, dark, sardonic father. Aline brought food and wine
for her husband and his friend, and then sat down to her needlework, favouring
her menfolk from time to time with a smiling glance of serene contentment. When
her son fell asleep in Cadfael’s lap she rose and lifted the boy away gently.
He was heavy for her, but she had learned how to carry him lightly balanced on
arm and shoulder. Cadfael watched her fondly as she bore the child away into
the next room to his bed, and closed the door between. “How is it possible that that girl can
grow every day more radiant and lovely? I’ve known marriage rub the fine bloom
off many a handsome maid. Yet it suits her as a halo does a saint.” “Oh, there’s something to be said for
marriage,” said Hugh idly. “Do I look so poorly on it? Though it’s an odd study
for a man of your habit, after all these years of celibacy… And all the
stravagings about the world before that! You can’t have thought too highly of
the wedded state, or you’d have ventured on it yourself. You took no vows until
past forty, and you a well-set-up young fellow crusading all about the east
with the best of them. How do I know you have not an Aline of your own locked
away somewhere, somewhere in your remembrance, as dear as mine is to me?
Perhaps even a Giles of your own,” he added, whimsically smiling, “a Giles God
knows where, grown a man now…” Cadfael’s silence and stillness, though
perfectly easy and complacent, nevertheless sounded a mute warning in Hugh’s
perceptive senses. On the edge of drowsiness among his cushions after a long
day out of doors, he opened a black, considering eye to train upon his friend’s
musing face, and withdrew delicately into practical business. “Well, so this Simeon Poer is known in the
south. I’m grateful to you and to Brother Adam for the nudge, though so far the
man has set no foot wrong here. But these others you’ve pictured for me… At
Wat’s tavern in the Foregate they’ve had practice in marking down strangers who
come with a fair or a feast, and spread themselves large about the town. Wat
tells my people he has a group moving in, very merry, some of them strangers.
They could well be these you name. Some of them, of course, the usual young
fellows of the town and the Foregate with more pence than sense. They’ve been
drinking a great deal, and throwing dice. Wat does not like the way the dice
fall.” “It’s as I supposed,” said Cadfael,
nodding. “For every Mass of ours they’ll be celebrating the Gamblers’ Mass
elsewhere. And by all means let the fools throw their money after their sense,
so the odds be fair. But Wat knows a loaded throw when he sees one.” “He knows how to rid his house of the
plague, too. He has hissed in the ears of one of the strangers that his tavern
is watched, and they’d be wise to take their school out of there. And for
tonight he has a lad on the watch, to find out where they’ll meet. Tomorrow
night we’ll have at them, and rid you of them in good time for the feast day,
if all goes well.” Which would be a very welcome cleansing,
thought Cadfael, making his way back across the bridge in the first limpid
dusk, with the river swirling its coiled currents beneath him in gleams of
reflected light, low summer water leaving the islands outlined in swathes of
drowned, browning weed. But as yet there was nothing to shed light, even by
reflected, phantom gleams, upon that death so far away in the south country,
whence the merchant Simeon Poer had set out. On pilgrimage for his respectable
soul? Or in flight from a law aroused too fiercely for his safety, by something
graver than the cozening of fools? Though Cadfael felt too close to folly
himself to be loftily complacent even about that, however much it might be
argued that gamblers deserved all they got. The great gate of the abbey was closed,
but the wicket in it stood open, shedding sunset light through from the west.
In the mild dazzle Cadfael brushed shoulders and sleeves with another entering,
and was a little surprised to be hoisted deferentially through the wicket by a
firm hand at his elbow. “Give you goodnight, brother!” sang a
mellow voice in his ear, as the returning guest stepped within on his heels.
And the solid, powerful, woollen-gowned form of Simeon Poer, self-styled
merchant of Guildford, rolled vigorously past him, and crossed the great court
to the stone steps of the guest-hall. Chapter Six THEY WERE EMERGING from High Mass on the
morning of the twenty-first day of June, the eve of Saint Winifred’s
translation, stepping out into a radiant morning, when the abbot’s sedate
progress towards his lodging was rudely disrupted by a sudden howl of dismay
among the dispersing multitude of worshippers, a wild ripple of movement
cleaving a path through their ranks, and the emergence of a frantic figure
lurching forth on clumsy, naked feet to clutch at the abbot’s robe, and appeal
in a loud, indignant cry, “Father Abbot, stand my friend and give me justice,
for I am robbed! A thief, there is a thief among us!” The abbot looked down in astonishment and
concern into the face of Ciaran, convulsed and ablaze with resentment and
distress. “Father, I beg you, see justice done! I am
helpless unless you help me!” He awoke, somewhat late, to the
unwarranted violence of his behaviour, and fell on his knees at the abbot’s
feet. “Pardon, pardon! I am too loud and troublous, I hardly know what I say!” The press of gossiping, festive
worshippers just loosed from Mass had fallen quiet all in a moment, and instead
of dispersing drew in about them to listen and stare, avidly curious. The monks
of the house, hindered in their orderly departure, hovered in quiet
deprecation. Cadfael looked beyond the kneeling, imploring figure of Ciaran for
its inseparable twin, and found Matthew just shouldering his way forward out of
the crowd, open-mouthed and wide-eyed in patent bewilderment, to stand at gaze
a few paces apart, and frown helplessly from the abbot to Ciaran and back
again, in search of the cause of this abrupt turmoil. Was it possible that
something had happened to the one that the other of the matched pair did not
know? “Get up!” said Radulfus, erect and calm.
“No need to kneel. Speak out whatever you have to say, and you shall have
right.” The pervasive silence spread, grew, filled
even the most distant reaches of the great court. Those who had already
scattered to the far corners turned and crept unobtrusively back again,
large-eyed and prick-eared, to hang upon the fringes of the crowd already
assembled. Ciaran clambered to his feet, voluble
before he was erect. “Father, I had a ring, the copy of one the lord bishop of
Winchester keeps for his occasions, bearing his device and inscription. Such
copies he uses to afford safe-conduct to those he sends forth on his business
or with his blessing, to open doors to them and provide protection on the road.
Father, the ring is gone!” “This ring was given to you by Henry of
Blois himself?” asked Radulfus. “No, Father, not in person. I was in the
service of the prior of Hyde Abbey, a lay clerk, when this mortal sickness came
on me, and I took this vow of mine to spend my remaining days in the canonry of
Aberdaron. My prior—you know that Hyde is without an abbot, and has been for
some years—my prior asked the lord bishop, of his goodness, to give me what
protection he could for my journey…” So that had been the starting point of
this barefoot journey, thought Cadfael, enlightened. Winchester itself, or as
near as made no matter, for the New Minster of that city, always a jealous
rival of the Old, where Bishop Henry presided, had been forced to abandon its
old home in the city thirty years ago, and banished to Hyde Mead, on the
north-western outskirts. There was no love lost between Henry and the community
at Hyde, for it was the bishop who had been instrumental in keeping them
deprived of an abbot for so long, in pursuit of his own ambition of turning
them into an episcopal monastery. The struggle had been going on for some time,
the bishop deploying various schemes to get the house into his own hands, and
the prior using every means to resist these manipulations. It seemed Henry had
still the grace to show compassion even on a servant of the hostile house, when
he fell under the threat of disease and death. The traveller over whom the
bishop-legate spread his protecting hand would pass unmolested wherever law
retained its validity. Only those irreclaimably outlaw already would dare
interfere with him. “Father, the ring is gone, stolen from me
this very morning. See here, the slashed threads that held it!” Ciaran heaved
forward the drab linen scrip that rode at his belt, and showed two dangling
ends of cord, very cleanly severed. “A sharp knife—someone here has such a
dagger. And my ring is gone!” Prior Robert was at the abbot’s elbow by
then, agitated out of his silvery composure. “Father, what this man says is
true. He showed me the ring. Given to ensure him aid and hospitality on his
journey, which is of most sad and solemn import. If now it is lost, should not
the gate be closed while we enquire?” “Let it be so,” said Radulfus, and stood
silent to see Brother Jerome, ever ready and assiduous on the prior’s heels,
run to see the order carried out. “Now, take breath and thought, for your loss
cannot be lost far. You did not wear the ring, then, but carried it knotted
securely by this cord, within your scrip?” “Yes, Father. It was beyond words precious
to me.” “And when did you last ascertain that it
was still there, and safe?” “Father, this very morning I know I had
it. Such few things as I possess, here they lie before you. Could I fail to see
if this cord had been cut in the night while I slept? It is not so. This
morning all was as I left it last night. I have been bidden to rest, by reason
of my barefoot vow. Today I ventured out only for Mass. Here in the very
church, in this great press of worshippers, some malevolent has broken every
ban, and slashed loose my ring from me.” And indeed, thought Cadfael, running a
considering eye round all the curious, watching faces, it would not be
difficult, in such a press, to find the strings that anchored the hidden ring,
flick it out from its hiding-place, cut the strings and make away with it,
discreetly between crowding bodies, and never be seen by a soul or felt by the
victim. A neat thing, done so privately and expertly that even Matthew, who
missed nothing that touched his friend, had missed this impudent assault. For
Matthew stood there staring, obviously taken by surprise, and unsure as yet how
to take this turn of events. His face was unreadable, closed and still, his
eyes narrowed and bright, darting from face to face as Ciaran or abbot or prior
spoke. Cadfael noted that Melangell had stolen forward close to him, and taken
him hesitantly by the sleeve. He did not shake her off. By the slight lift of
his head and widening of his eyes he knew who had touched him, and he let his
hand feel for hers and clasp it, while his whole attention seemed to be fixed
on Ciaran. Somewhere not far behind them Rhun leaned on his crutches, his fair
face frowning in anxious dismay, Aunt Alice attendant at his shoulder, bright
with curiosity. Here are we all, thought Cadfael, and not one of us knows what
is in any other mind, or who has done what has been done, or what will come of
it for any of those who look on and marvel. “You cannot tell,” suggested Prior Robert,
agitated and grieved, “who stood close to you during the service? If indeed
some ill-conditioned person has so misused the holy office as to commit theft
in the very sacredness of the Mass…” “Father, I was intent only upon the
altar.” Ciaran shook with fervour, holding the ravished scrip open before him
with his sparse possessions bared to be seen. “We were close pressed, so many
people… as is only seemly, in such a shrine… Matthew was close at my back, but
so he ever is. Who else there may have been by me, how can I say? There was no
man nor woman among us who was not hemmed in every way.” “It is truth,” said Prior Robert, who had
been much gratified at the large attendance. “Father, the gate is now closed,
we are all here who were present at Mass. And surely we all have a desire to
see this wrong righted.” “All, as I suppose,” said Radulfus drily,
“but one. One, who brought in here a knife or dagger sharp enough to slice
through these tough cords cleanly. What other intents he brought in with him, I
bid him consider and tremble for his soul. Robert, this ring must be found. All
men of goodwill here will offer their aid, and show freely what they have. So
will every guest who has not theft and sacrilege to hide. And see to it also
that enquiry be made, whether other articles of value have not been missed. For
one theft means one thief, here within.” “It shall be seen to, Father,” said Robert
fervently. “No honest, devout pilgrim will grudge to offer his aid. How could
he wish to share his lodging here with a thief?” There was a stir of agreement and support,
perhaps slightly delayed, as every man and woman eyed a neighbour, and then in
haste elected to speak first. They came from every direction, hitherto unknown
to one another, mingling and forming friendships now with the abandon of holiday.
But how did they know who was immaculate and who was suspect, now the world had
probed a merciless finger within the fold? “Father,” pleaded Ciaran, still sweating
and shaking with distress, “here I offer in this scrip all that I brought into
this enclave. Examine it, show that I have indeed been robbed. Here I came
without even shoes to my feet, my all is here in your hands. And my fellow
Matthew will open to you his own scrip as freely, an example to all these
others that they may deliver themselves pure of blame. What we offer, they will
not refuse.” Matthew had withdrawn his hand from
Melangell’s sharply at this word. He shifted the unbleached cloth scrip, very
like Ciaran’s, round upon his hip. Ciaran’s meagre travelling equipment lay
open in the prior’s hands. Robert slid them back into the pouch from which they
had come, and looked where Ciaran’s distressed gaze guided him. “Into your hands, Father, and willingly,”
said Matthew, and stripped the bag from its buckles and held it forth. Robert acknowledged the offering with a
grave bow, and opened and probed it with delicate consideration. Most of what
was there within he did not display, though he handled it. A spare shirt and
linen drawers, crumpled from being carried so, and laundered on the way,
probably more than once. The means of a gentleman’s sparse toilet, razor,
morsel of lye soap, a leather-bound breviary, a lean purse, a folded trophy of
embroidered ribbon. Robert drew forth the only item he felt he must show, a
sheathed dagger, such as any gentleman might carry at his right hip, barely
longer than a man’s hand. “Yes, that is mine,” said Matthew, looking
Abbot Radulfus straightly in the eyes. “It has not slashed through those cords.
Nor has it left my scrip since I entered your enclave, Father Abbot.” Radulfus looked from the dagger to its
owner, and briefly nodded. “I well understand that no young man would set forth
on these highroads today without the means of defending himself. All the more
if he had another to defend, who carried no weapons. As I understand is your
condition, my son. Yet within these walls you should not bear arms.” “What, then, should I have done?” demanded
Matthew, with a stiffening neck, and a note in his voice that just fell short
of defiance. “What you must do now,” said Radulfus
firmly. “Give it into the care of Brother Porter at the gatehouse, as others
have done with their weapons. When you leave here you may reclaim it freely.” There was nothing to be done but bow the
head and give way gracefully, and Matthew managed it decently enough, but not
gladly. “I will do so, Father, and pray your pardon that I did not ask advice
before.” “But, Father,” Ciaran pleaded anxiously,
“my ring… How shall I survive the way if I have not that safe-conduct to show?” “Your ring shall be sought throughout this
enclave, and every man who bears no guilt for its loss,” said the abbot,
raising his voice to carry to the distant fringes of the silent crowd, “will
freely offer his own possessions for inspection. See to it, Robert!” With that he proceeded on his way, and the
crowd, after some moments of stillness as they watched him out of sight,
dispersed in a sudden murmur of excited speculation. Prior Robert took Ciaran
under his wing, and swept away with him towards the guest-hall, to recruit help
from Brother Denis in his enquiries after the bishop’s ring; and Matthew, not
without one hesitant glance at Melangell, turned on his heel and went hastily
after them. A more innocent and co-operative company
than the guests at Shrewsbury abbey that day it would have been impossible to
find. Every man opened his bundle or box almost eagerly, in haste to
demonstrate his immaculate virtue. The quest, conducted as delicately as
possible, went on all the afternoon, but they found no trace of the ring.
Moreover, one or two of the better-off inhabitants of the common dormitory, who
had had no occasion to penetrate to the bottom of their baggage so far, made
grievous discoveries when they were obliged to do so. A yeoman from Lichfield
found his reserve purse lighter by half than when he had tucked it away. Master
Simeon Poer, one of the first to fling open his possessions, and the loudest in
condemning so blasphemous a crime, claimed to have been robbed of a silver
chain he had intended to present at the altar next day. A poor parish priest,
making this pilgrimage the one fulfilled dream of his life, was left lamenting
the loss of a small casket, made by his own hands over more than a year, and
decorated with inlays of silver and glass, in which he had hoped to carry back
with him some memento of his visit, a dried flower from the garden, even a
thread or two drawn from the fringe of the altar-cloth under Saint Winifred’s
reliquary. A merchant from Worcester could not find his good leather belt to
his best coat, saved up for the morrow. One or two others had a suspicion that
their belongings had been fingered and scorned, which was worst of all. It was all over, and fruitless, when
Cadfael at last repaired to his workshop in time to await the coming of Rhun.
The boy came prompt to his hour, great-eyed and thoughtful, and lay submissive
and mute under Cadfael’s ministrations, which probed every day a little deeper
into his knotted and stubborn tissues. “Brother,” he said at length, looking up,
“you did not find a dagger in any other man’s pouch, did you?” “No, no such thing.” Though there had
been, understandably, a number of small, homely knives, the kind a man needs to
hack his bread and meat in lodgings along the way, or meals under a hedge. Many
of them were sharp enough for most everyday purposes, but not sharp enough to
leave stout cords sheared through without a twitch to betray the assault. “But
men who go shaven carry razors, too, and a blunt razor would be an abomination.
Once a thief comes into the pale, child, it’s hard for honest men to be a match
for him. He who has no scruple has always the advantage of those who keep to
rule. But you need not trouble your heart, you’ve done no wrong to any man.
Never let this ill thing spoil tomorrow for you.” “No,” agreed the boy, still preoccupied.
“But, brother, there is another dagger—one, at least. Sheath and all, a good
length—I know, I was pressed close against him yesterday at Mass. You know I
have to hold fast by my crutches to stand for long, and he had a big linen
scrip on his belt, hard against my hand and arm, where we were crowded
together. I felt the shape of it, cross-hilt and all. I know! But you did not
find it.” “And who was it,” asked Cadfael, still
carefully working the tissues that resisted his fingers, “who had this armoury
about him at Mass?” “It was that big merchant with the good
gown-made from valley wool. I’ve learned to know cloth. They call him Simeon
Poer. But you didn’t find it. Perhaps he’s handed it to Brother Porter, just as
Matthew has had to do now.” “Perhaps,” said Cadfael. “When was it you
discovered this? Yesterday? And what of today? Was he again close to you?” “No, not today.” No, today he had stood stolidly to watch
the play, eyes and ears alert, ready to open his pouch there before all if need
be, smiling complacently as the abbot directed the disarming of another man. He
had certainly had no dagger on him then, however he had disposed of it in the
meantime. There were hiding-places enough here within the walls, for a dagger
and any amount of small, stolen valuables. To search was itself only a
pretence, unless authority was prepared to keep the gates closed and the guests
prisoned within until every yard of the gardens had been dug up, and every bed
and bench in dortoir and hall pulled to pieces. The sinners have always the
start of the honest men. “It was not fair that Matthew should be
made to surrender his dagger,” said Rhun, “when another man had one still about
him. And Ciaran already so terribly afraid to stir, not having his ring. He
won’t even come out of the dortoir until tomorrow. He is sick for loss of it.” Yes, that seemed to be true. And how
strange, thought Cadfael, pricked into realisation, to see a man sweating for
fear, who has already calmly declared himself as one condemned to death? Then
why fear? Fear should be dead. Yet men are strange, he thought in
revulsion. And a blessed and quiet death in Aberdaron, well-prepared, and
surrounded by the prayers and compassion of like-minded votaries, may well seem
a very different matter from crude slaughter by strangers and footpads
somewhere in the wilder stretches of the road. But this Simeon Poer—say he had such a
dagger yesterday, and therefore may well have had it on him today, in the
crowded array of the Mass. Then what did he do with it so quickly, before
Ciaran discovered his loss? And how did he know he must perforce dispose of it
quickly? Who had such fair warning of the need, if not the thief? “Trouble your head no more,” said Cadfael,
looking down at the boy’s beautiful, vulnerable face, “for Matthew nor for
Ciaran, but think only of the morrow, when you approach the saint. Both she and
God see you all, and have no need to be told of what your needs are. All you
have to do is wait in quiet for whatever will be. For whatever it may be, it
will not be wanton. Did you take your dose last night?” Rhun’s pale, brilliant eyes were startled
wide open, sunlight and ice, blindingly clear. “No. It was a good day, I wanted
to give thanks. It isn’t that I don’t value what you can do for me. Only I
wished also to give something. And I did sleep, truly I slept well…” “So do tonight also,” said Cadfael gently,
and slid an arm round the boy’s body to hoist him steadily upright. “Say your
prayers, think quietly what you should do, do it, and sleep. There is no man
living, neither king nor emperor, can do more or better, or trust in a better
harvest.” Ciaran did not stir from within the
guest-hall again that day. Matthew did, against all precedent emerging from the
arched doorway without his companion, and standing at the head of the stone
staircase to the great court with hands spread to touch the courses of the deep
doorway, and head drawn back to heave in great breaths of evening air. Supper
was eaten, the milder evening stir of movement threaded the court, in the cool,
grateful lull before Compline. Brother Cadfael had left the chapter-house
before the end of the readings, having a few things to attend to in the
herbarium, and was crossing towards the garden when he caught sight of the
young man standing there at the top of the steps, breathing in deeply and with
evident pleasure. For some reason Matthew looked taller for being alone, and
younger, his face closed but tranquil in the soft evening light. When he moved
forward and began to descend to the court, Cadfael looked instinctively for the
other figure that should have been close behind him, if not in its usual place
a step before him, but no Ciaran emerged. Well, he had been urged to rest, and
presumably was glad to comply, but never before had Matthew left his side, by
night or day, resting or stirring. Not even to follow Melangell, except
broodingly with his eyes and against his will. People, thought Cadfael, going on his way
without haste, people are endlessly mysterious, and I am endlessly curious. A
sin to be confessed, no doubt, and well worth a penance. As long as man is
curious about his fellowman, that appetite alone will keep him alive. Why do
folk do the things they do? Why, if you know you are diseased and dying, and
wish to reach a desired haven before the end, why do you condemn yourself to do
the long journey barefoot, and burden yourself with a weight about your neck?
How are you thus rendered more acceptable to God, when you might have lent a
hand to someone on the road crippled not by perversity but from birth, like the
boy Rhun? And why do you dedicate your youth and strength to following another
man step by step the length of the land, and why does he suffer you to be his
shadow, when he should be composing his mind to peace, and taking a decent
leave of his friends, not laying his own load upon them? There he checked, rounding the corner of
the yew hedge into the rose garden. It was not his fellow-man he beheld,
sitting in the turf on the far side of the flower beds, gazing across the slope
of the pease fields beyond and the low, stony, silvery summer waters of the
Meole brook, but his fellow-woman, solitary and still, her knees drawn up under
her chin and encircled closely by her folded arms. Aunt Alice Weaver, no doubt,
was deep in talk with half a dozen worthy matrons of her own generation, and
Rhun, surely, already in his bed. Melangell had stolen away alone to be quiet
here in the garden and nurse her lame dreams and indomitable hopes. She was a
small, dark shape, gold-haloed against the bright west. By the look of that
sky, tomorrow, Saint Winifred’s day, would again be cloudless and beautiful. The whole width of the rose garden was
between them, and she did not hear him come and pass by on the grassy path to
his final duties of the day in his workshop, seeing everything put away tidily,
checking the stoppers of all his flagons and flasks, and making sure the
brazier, which had been in service earlier, was safely quenched and cooled.
Brother Oswin, young, enthusiastic and devoted, was nonetheless liable to
overlook details, though he had now outlived his tendency to break things.
Cadfael ran an eye over everything, and found it good. There was no hurry now,
he had time before Compline to sit down here in the wood-scented dimness and
think. Time for others to lose and find one another, and use or waste these
closing moments of the day. For those three blameless tradesmen, Walter Bagot,
glover; John Shure, tailor; William Hales, farrier; to betake themselves to
wherever their dice school was to meet this night, and run their necks into
Hugh’s trap. Time for that more ambiguous character, Simeon Poer, to evade or
trip into the same snare, or go the other way about some other nocturnal
business of his own. Cadfael had seen two of the former three go out from the
gatehouse, and the third follow some minutes later, and was sure in his own
mind that the self-styled merchant of Guildford would not be long after them.
Time, too, for that unaccountably solitary young man, somehow loosed off his
chain, to range this whole territory suddenly opened to him, and happen upon
the solitary girl. Cadfael put up his feet on the wooden
bench, and closed his eyes for a brief respite. Matthew was there at her back before she
knew it. The sudden rustle as he stepped into sun-dried long grass at the edge
of the field startled her, and she swung round in alarm, scrambling to her
knees and staring up into his face with dilated eyes, half-blinded by the blaze
of the sunset into which she had been steadily staring. Her face was utterly
open, vulnerable and childlike. She looked as she had looked when he had swept
her up in his arms and leaped the ditch with her, clear of the galloping
horses. Just so she had opened her eyes and looked up at him, still dazed and
frightened, and just so had her fear melted away into wonder and pleasure,
finding in him nothing but reassurance, kindness and admiration. That pure, paired encounter of eyes did
not last long. She blinked, and shook her head a little to clear her dazzled
vision, and looked beyond him, searching, not believing he could be here alone. “Ciaran…? Is there something you need for
him?” “No,” said Matthew shortly, and for a
moment turned his head away. “He’s in his bed.” “But you never leave his bed!” It was said
in innocence, even in anxiety. Whatever she grudged to Ciaran, she still pitied
and understood him. “You see I have left it,” said Matthew
harshly. “I have needs, too… a breath of air. And he is very well where he is,
and won’t stir.” “I was well sure,” she said with resigned
bitterness, “that you had not come out to look for me.” She made to rise,
swiftly and gracefully enough, but he put out a hand, almost against his will,
as it seemed, to take her under the wrist and lift her. It was withdrawn as
abruptly when she evaded his touch, and rose to her feet unaided. “But at
least,” she said deliberately, “you did not turn and run from me when you found
me. I should be grateful even for that.” “I am not free,” he protested, stung. “You
know it better than any.” “Then neither were you free when we kept
pace along the road,” said Melangell fiercely, “when you carried my burden, and
walked beside me, and let Ciaran hobble along before, where he could not see
how you smiled on me then and were gallant and cherished me when the road was
rough and spoke softly, as if you took delight in being beside me. Why did you
not give me warning then that you were not free? Or better, take him some other
way, and leave us alone? Then I might have taken good heed in time, and in time
forgotten you. As now I never shall! Never, to my life’s end!” All the flesh of his lips and cheeks
shrank and tightened before her eyes, in a contortion of either rage or pain,
she could not tell which. She was staring too close and too passionately to see
very clearly. He turned his head sharply away, to evade her eyes. “You charge me justly,” he said in a harsh
whisper, “I was at fault. I never should have believed there could be so clean
and sweet a happiness for me. I should have left you, but I could not… Oh, God!
You think I could have turned him? He clung to you, to your good aunt… Yet I
should have been strong enough to hold off from you and let you alone…” As
rapidly as he had swung away from her he swung back again, reaching a hand to
take her by the chin and hold her face to face with him, so ungently that she
felt the pressure of his fingers bruising her flesh. “Do you know how hard a
thing you are asking? No! This countenance you never saw, did you, never but through
someone else’s eyes. Who would provide you a mirror to see yourself? Some pool,
perhaps, if ever you had the leisure to lean over and look. How should you know
what this face can do to a man already lost? And you marvel I took what I could
get for water in a drought, when it walked beside me? I should rather have died
than stay beside you, to trouble your peace. God forgive me!” She was five years nearer childhood than
he, even taking into account the two years or more a girl child has advantage
over the boys of her own age. She stood entranced, a little frightened by his
intensity, and inexpressibly moved by the anguish she felt emanating from him
like a raw, drowning odour. The long-fingered hand that held her shook
terribly, his whole body quivered. She put up her own hand gently and closed it
over his, uplifted out of her own wretchedness by his greater and more
inexplicable distress. “I dare not speak for God,” she said
steadily, “but whatever there may be for me to forgive, that I dare. It is not
your fault that I love you. All you ever did was be kinder to me than ever man
was since I left Wales. And I did know, love, you did tell me, if I had heeded
then, you did tell me you were a man under vow. What it was you never told me,
but never grieve, oh, my own soul, never grieve so…” While they stood rapt, the sunset light
had deepened, blazed and burned silently into glowing ash, and the first
feathery shade of twilight, like the passing of a swift’s wings, fled across
their faces and melted into sudden pearly, radiant light. Her wide eyes were
brimming with tears, almost the match of his. When he stooped to her, there was
no way of knowing which of them had begun the kiss. The little bell for Compline sounded
clearly through the gardens on so limpid an evening, and stirred Brother
Cadfael out of his half-doze at once. He was accustomed, in this refuge of his
maturity as surely as in the warfaring of his youth, to awake fresh and alert,
as he fell asleep, making the most of the twin worlds of night and day. He rose
and went out into the earliest glowing image of evening, and closed the door
after him. It was but a few moments back to church
through the herbarium and the rose garden. He went briskly, happy with the
beauty of the evening and the promise for the morrow, and never knew why he
should look aside to westward in passing, unless it was that the whole expanse
of the sky on that side was delicate, pure and warming, like a girl’s blush.
And there they were, two clear shadows clasped together in silhouette against
the fire of the west, outlined on the crest above the slope to the invisible
brook. Matthew and Melangell, unmistakable, constrained still but in each
other’s arms, linked in a kiss that lasted while Brother Cadfael came, passed
and slipped away to his different devotions, but with that image printed
indelibly on his eyes, even in his prayers. Chapter Seven THE OUTRIDER of the bishop-legate’s
envoy—or should he rather be considered the empress’s envoy?—arrived within the
town and was directed through to the gatehouse of the castle in mid-evening of
that same twenty-first day of June, to be presented to Hugh Beringar just as he
was marshalling a half-dozen men to go down to the bridge and take an
unpredicted part in the plans of Master Simeon Poer and his associates. Who
would almost certainly be armed, being so far from home and in hitherto
unexplored territory. Hugh found the visitor an unwelcome hindrance, but was
too well aware of the many perils hemming the king’s party on every side to dismiss
the herald without ceremony. Whatever this embassage might be, he needed to
know it, and make due preparation to deal with it. In the gatehouse guard-room
he found himself facing a stolid middle-aged squire, who delivered his errand
word perfect. “My lord sheriff, the Lady of the English
and the lord bishop of Winchester entreat you to receive in peace their envoy,
who comes to you with offerings of peace and good order in their name, and in
their name asks your aid in resolving the griefs of the kingdom. I come before
to announce him.” So the empress had assumed the traditional
title of a queen-elect before her coronation! The matter began to look final. “The lord bishop’s envoy will be welcome,”
said Hugh, “and shall be received with all honour here in Shrewsbury. I will
lend an attentive ear to whatever he may have to say to me. As at this moment I
have an affair in hand which will not wait. How far ahead of your lord do you
ride?” “A matter of two hours, perhaps,” said the
squire, considering. “Good, then I can set forward all
necessary preparations for his reception, and still have time to clear up a
small thing I have in hand. With how many attendants does he come?” “Two men-at-arms only, my lord, and
myself.” “Then I will leave you in the hands of my
deputy, who will have lodgings made ready for you and your two men here in the
castle. As for your lord, he shall come to my own house, and my wife shall make
him welcome. Hold me excused if I make small ceremony now, for this business is
a twilight matter, and will not wait. Later I will see amends made.” The messenger was well content to have his
horse stabled and tended, and be led away by Alan Herbard to a comfortable
lodging where he could shed his boots and leather coat, and be at his ease, and
take his time and his pleasure over the meat and wine that was presently set
before him. Hugh’s young deputy would play the host very graciously. He was
still new in office, and did everything committed to him with a flourish. Hugh
left them to it, and took his half-dozen men briskly out through the town. It was past Compline then, neither light
nor dark, but hesitant between. By the time they reached the High Cross and
turned down the steep curve of the Wyle they had their twilight eyes. In full
darkness their quarry might have a better chance of eluding them, by daylight
they would themselves have been too easily observed from afar. If these
gamesters were experts they would have a lookout posted to give fair warning. The Wyle, uncoiling eastward, brought them
down to the town wall and the English gate, and there a thin, leggy child,
shaggy-haired and bright-eyed, started out of the shadows under the gate to
catch at Hugh’s sleeve. Wat’s boy, a sharp urchin of the Foregate, bursting
with the importance of his errand and his own wit in managing it, had pinned
down his quarry, and waited to inform and advise. “My lord, they’re met—all the four from
the abbey, and a dozen or more from these parts, mostly from the town.” His
note of scorn implied that they were sharper in the Foregate. “You’d best leave
the horses and go afoot. Riders out at this hour—they’d break and run as soon
as you set hooves on the bridge. The sound carries.” Good sense, that, if the meeting-place was
close by. “Where are they, then?” asked Hugh, dismounting. “Under the far arch of the bridge, my
lord—dry as a bone it is, and snug.” So it would be, with this low summer
water. Only in full spate did the river prevent passage beneath that arch. In
this fine season it would be a nest of dried-out grasses. “They have a light, then?” “A dark lantern. There’s not a glimmer
you’ll see from either side unless you go down to the water, it sheds light
only on the flat stone where they’re throwing.” Easily quenched, then, at the first alarm,
and they would scatter like startled birds, every way. The fleecers would be
the first and fleetest. The fleeced might well be netted in some numbers, but
their offence was no more than being foolish at their own expense, not theft
nor malpractice on any other. “We leave the horses here,” said Hugh,
making up his mind. “You heard the boy. They’re under the bridge, they’ll have
used the path that goes down to the Gaye, along the riverside. The other side
of the arch is thick bushes, but that’s the way they’ll break. Three men to
either slope, and I’ll bear with the western three. And let our own young fools
by, if you can pick them out, but hold fast the strangers.” In this fashion they went to their
raiding. They crossed the bridge by ones and twos, above the Severn water green
with weedy shallows and shimmering with reflected light, and took their places
on either side, spaced among the fringing bushes of the bank. By the time they
were in place the afterglow had dissolved and faded into the western horizon,
and the night came down like a velvet hand. Hugh drew off to westward along the
by-road until at length he caught the faint glimmer of light beneath the stone
arch. They were there. If in such numbers, perhaps he should have held them in
better respect and brought more men. But he did not want the townsmen. By all
means let them sneak away to their beds and think better of their dreams of
milking cows likely to prove drier than sand. It was the cheats he wanted. Let
the provost of the town deal with his civic idiots. He let the sky darken somewhat before he
took them in. The summer night settled, soft wings folding, and no moon. Then,
at his whistle, they moved down from either flank. It was the close-set bushes on the bank,
rustling stealthily in a windless night, that betrayed their coming a moment
too soon. Whoever was on watch, below there, had a sharp ear. There was a
shrill whistle, suddenly muted. The lantern went out instantly, there was black
dark under the solid stonework of the bridge. Down went Hugh and his men,
abandoning stealth for speed. Bodies parted, collided, heaved and fled, with no
sound but the panting and gasping of scared breath. Hugh’s officers waded
through bushes, closing down to seal the archway. Some of those thus penned
beneath the bridge broke to left, some to right, not venturing to climb into
waiting arms, but wading through the shallows and floundering even into deeper
water. A few struck out for the opposite shore, local lads well acquainted with
their river and its reaches, and water-borne, like its fish, almost from birth.
Let them go, they were Shrewsbury born and bred. If they had lost money, more
fools they, but let them get to their beds and repent in peace. If their wives
would let them! But there were those beneath the arch of
the bridge who had not Severn water in their blood, and were less ready to wet
more than their feet in even low water. And suddenly these had steel in their
hands, and were weaving and slashing and stabbing their way through into the
open as best they could, and without scruple. It did not last long. In the
quaking dark, sprawled among the trampled grasses up the riverside, Hugh’s six
clung to such captives as they could grapple, and shook off trickles of blood
from their own scratches and gashes. And diminishing in the darkness, the
thresh and toss of bushes marked the flight of those who had got away. Unseen
beneath the bridge, the deserted lantern and scattered dice, grave loss to a
trickster who must now prepare a new set, lay waiting to be retrieved. Hugh shook off a few drops of blood from a
grazed arm, and went scrambling through the rough grass to the path leading up
from the Gaye to the highroad and the bridge. Before him a shadowy body fled,
cursing. Hugh launched a shout to reach the road ahead of them: “Hold him! The
law wants him!” Foregate and town might be on their way to bed, but there were
always late strays, both lawful and unlawful, and some on both sides would
joyfully take up such an invitation to mischief or justice, whichever way the
mind happened to bend. Above him, in the deep, soft summer night
that now bore only a saffron thread along the west, an answering hail shrilled,
startled and merry, and there were confused sounds of brief, breathless
struggle. Hugh loped up to the highroad to see three shadowy horsemen halted at
the approach to the bridge, two of them closed in to flank the first, and that
first leaning slightly from his saddle to grip in one hand the collar of a
panting figure that leaned against his mount heaving in breath, and with small
energy to attempt anything besides. “I think, sir,” said the captor, eyeing
Hugh’s approach, “this may be what you wanted. It seemed to me that the law
cried out for him? Am I then addressing the law in these parts?” It was a fine, ringing voice, unaccustomed
to subduing its tone. The soft dark did not disclose his face clearly, but
showed a body erect in the saddle, supple, shapely, unquestionably young. He
shifted his grip on the prisoner, as though to surrender him to a better claim.
Thus all but released, the fugitive did not break free and run for it, but
spread his feet and stood his ground, half-defiant, eyeing Hugh dubiously. “I’m in your debt for a minnow, it seems,”
said Hugh, grinning as he recognised the man he had been chasing. “But I doubt
I’ve let all the salmon get clear away up-river. We were about breaking up a
parcel of cheating rogues come here looking for prey, but this young gentleman
you have by the coat turns out to be merely one of the simpletons, our worthy
goldsmith out of the town. Master Daniel, I doubt there’s more gold and silver
to be lost than gained, in the company you’ve been keeping.” “It’s no crime to make a match at dice,”
muttered the young man, shuffling his feet sullenly in the dust of the road.
“My luck would have turned…” “Not with the dice they brought with them.
But true it’s no crime to waste your evening and go home with empty pockets,
and I’ve no charge to make against you, provided you go back now, and hand
yourself over with the rest to my sergeant. Behave yourself prettily, and
you’ll be home by midnight.” Master Daniel Aurifaber took his dismissal
thankfully, and slouched back towards the bridge, to be gathered in among the
captives. The sound of hooves crossing the bridge at a trot indicated that someone
had run for the horses, and intended a hunt to westward, in the direction the
birds of prey had taken. In less than a mile they would be safe in woodland,
and it would take hounds to run them to earth. Small chance of hunting them
down by night. On the morrow something might be attempted. “This is hardly the welcome I intended for
you,” said Hugh, peering up into the shadowy face above him. “For you, I think,
must be the envoy sent from the Empress Maud and the bishop of Winchester. Your
herald arrived little more than an hour ago, I did not expect you quite so
soon. I had thought I should be done with this matter by the time you came. My
name is Hugh Beringar, I stand here as sheriff for King Stephen. Your men are
provided for at the castle, I’ll send a guide with them. You, sir, are my own
guest, if you will do my house that honour.” “You’re very gracious,” said the empress’s
messenger blithely, “and with all my heart I will. But had you not better first
make up your accounts with these townsmen of yours, and let them creep away to
their beds? My business can well wait a little longer.” “Not the most successful action ever I
planned,” Hugh owned later to Cadfael. “I under-estimated both their hardihood
and the amount of cold steel they’d have about them.” There were four guests missing from
Brother Denis’s halls that night: Master Simeon Poer, merchant of Guildford;
Walter Bagot, glover; John Shure, tailor; William Hales, farrier. Of these,
William Hales lay that night in a stone cell in Shrewsbury castle, along with a
travelling pedlar who had touted for them in the town, but the other three had
all broken safely away, bar a few scratches and bruises, into the woods to
westward, the most northerly outlying spinneys of the Long Forest, there to bed
down in the warm night and count their injuries and their gains, which were
considerable. They could not now return to the abbey or the town; the traffic
would in any case have stood only one more night at a profit. Three nights are
the most to be reckoned on, after that some aggrieved wretch is sure to grow
suspicious. Nor could they yet venture south again. But the man who lives on
his wits must keep them well honed and adaptable, and there are more ways than
one of making a dishonest living. As for the young rufflers and simple
tradesmen who had come out with visions of rattling their winnings on the way
home to their wives, they were herded into the gatehouse to be chided, warned,
and sent home chapfallen, with very little in their pockets. And there the night’s work would have
ended, if the flare of the torch under the gateway had not caught the metal
gleam of a ring on Daniel Aurifaber’s right hand, flat silver with an oval
bezel, for one instant sharply defined. Hugh saw it, and laid a hand on the
goldsmith’s arm to detain him. “That ring-let me see it closer!” Daniel handed it over with a hint of
reluctance, though it seemed to stem rather from bewilderment than from any
feeling of guilt. It fitted closely, and passed over his knuckle with slight
difficulty, but the finger bore no sign of having worn it regularly. “Where did you get this?” asked Hugh,
holding it under the flickering light to examine the device and inscription. “I bought it honestly,” said Daniel
defensively. “That I need not doubt. But from whom?
From one of those gamesters? Which one?” “The merchant—Simeon Poer he called
himself. He offered it, and it was a good piece of work. I paid well for it.” “You have paid double for it, my friend,”
said Hugh, “for you bid fair to lose ring and money and all. Did it never enter
your mind that it might be stolen?” By the single nervous flutter of the
goldsmith’s eyelids the thought had certainly occurred to him, however
hurriedly he had put it out of his mind again. “No! Why should I think so? He
seemed a stout, prosperous person, all he claimed to be…” “This very morning,” said Hugh, “just such
a ring was taken during Mass from a pilgrim at the abbey. Abbot Radulfus sent
word up to the provost, after they had searched thoroughly within the pale, in
case it should be offered for sale in the market. I had the description of it
in turn from the provost. This is the device and inscription of the bishop of
Winchester, and it was given to the bearer to secure him safe-conduct on the
road.” “But I bought it in good faith,” protested
Daniel, dismayed. “I paid the man what he asked, the ring is mine, honestly
come by.” “From a thief. Your misfortune, lad, and
it may teach you to be more wary of sudden kind acquaintances in the future who
offer you rings to buy—wasn’t it so?—at somewhat less than you know to be their
value? Travelling men rattling dice give nothing for nothing, but take whatever
they can get. If they’ve emptied your purse for you, take warning for the next
time. This must go back to the lord abbot in the morning. Let him deal with the
owner.” He saw the goldsmith draw angry breath to complain of his deprivation,
and shook his head to ward off the effort, not unkindly. “You have no remedy.
Bite your tongue, Daniel, and go make your peace with your wife.” The empress’s envoy rode gently up the
Wyle in the deepening dark, keeping pace with Hugh’s smaller mount. His own was
a fine, tall beast, and the young man in the saddle was long of body and limb.
Afoot, thought Hugh, studying him sidelong, he will top me by a head. Very much
of an age with me, I might give him a year or two, hardly more. “Were you ever in Shrewbury before?” “Never. Once, perhaps, I was just within
the shire, I am not sure how the border runs. I was near Ludlow once. This
abbey of yours, I marked it as I came by, a very fine, large enclosure. They
keep the Benedictine Rule?” “They do.” Hugh expected further
questions, but they did not come. “You have kinsmen in the Order?” Even in the dark he was aware of his
companion’s grave, musing smile. “In a manner of speaking, yes, I have. I think
he would give me leave to call him so, though there is no blood-kinship. One
who used me like a son. I keep a kindness for the habit, for his sake. And did
I hear you say there are pilgrims here now? For some particular feast?” “For the translation of Saint Winifred,
who was brought here four years ago from Wales. Tomorrow is the day of her
arrival.” Hugh had spoken by custom, quite forgetting what Cadfael had told him
of that arrival, but the mention of it brought his friend’s story back sharply
to mind. “I was not in Shrewsbury then,” he said, withholding judgement. “I
brought my manors to King Stephen’s support the following year. My own country
is the north of the shire.” They had reached the top of the hill, and
were turning towards Saint Mary’s church. The great gate of Hugh’s courtyard
stood wide, with torches at the gateposts, waiting for them. His message had
been faithfully delivered to Aline, and she was waiting for them with all due
ceremony, the bedchamber prepared, the meal ready to come to table. All rules,
all times, bow to the coming of a guest, the duty and privilege of hospitality. She met them at the door, opening it wide
to welcome them in. They stepped into the hall, and into a flood of light from
torches at the walls and candles on the table, and instinctively they turned to
face each other, taking the first long look. It grew ever longer as their
intent eyes grew wider. It was a question which of them groped towards
recognition first. Memory pricked and realisation awoke almost stealthily.
Aline stood smiling and wondering, but mute, eyeing first one, then the other,
until they should stir and shed a clearer light. “But I know you!” said Hugh. “Now I see
you, I do know you.” “I have seen you before,” agreed the
guest. “I was never in this shire but the once, and yet…” “It needed light to see you by,” said
Hugh, “for I never heard your voice but the once, and then no more than a few
words. I doubt if you even remember them, but I do. Six words only. “Now have
ado with a man!” you said. And your name, your name I never heard but in a
manner I take as it was meant. You are Robert, the forester’s son who fetched
Yves Hugonin out of that robber fortress up on Titterstone Clee. And took him
home with you, I think, and his sister with him.” “And you are that officer who laid the
siege that gave me the cover I needed,” cried the guest, gleaming. “Forgive me
that I hid from you then, but I had no warranty there in your territory. How
glad I am to meet you honestly now, with no need to take to flight.” “And no need now to be Robert, the
forester’s son,” said Hugh, elated and smiling. “My name I have given you, and
the freedom of this house I offer with it. Now may I know yours?” “In Antioch, where I was born,” said the
guest, “I was called Daoud. But my father was an Englishman of Robert of
Normandy’s force, and among his comrades in arms I was baptised a Christian,
and took the name of the priest who stood my godfather. Now I bear the name of
Olivier de Bretagne.” They sat late into the night together,
savouring each other now face to face, after a year and a half of remembering
and wondering. But first, as was due, they made short work of Olivier’s errand
here. “I am sent,” he said seriously, “to urge
all sheriffs of shires to consider, whatever their previous fealty, whether
they should not now accept the proffered peace under the Empress Maud, and take
the oath of loyalty to her. This is the message of the bishop and the council:
This land has all too long been torn between two factions, and suffered great
damage and loss through their mutual enmity. And here, say that I lay no blame
on that party which is not my own, for there are valid claims on both sides,
and equally the blame falls on both for failing to come to some agreement to
end these distresses. The fortune at Lincoln might just as well have fallen the
opposing way, but it fell as it did, and England is left with a king made
captive, and a queen-elect free and in the ascendant. Is it not time to call a
halt? For the sake of order and peace and the sound regulation of the realm,
and to have a government in command which can and must put down the many
injustices and tyrannies which you know, as well as I, have set themselves up
outside all law. Surely any strong rule is better than no rule at all. For the
sake of peace and order, will you not accept the empress, and hold your county
in allegiance to her? She is already in Westminster now, the preparations for
her coronation go forward. There is a far better prospect of success if all
sheriffs come in to strengthen her rule.” “You are asking me,” said Hugh gently, “to
go back on my sworn fealty to King Stephen.” “Yes,” agreed Olivier honestly, “I am. For
weighty reasons, and in no treasonous mind. You need not love, only forbear
from hating. Think of it rather as keeping your fealty to the people of this
county of yours, and this land.” “That I can do as well or better on the
side where I began,” said Hugh, smiling. “It is what I am doing now, as best I
can. It is what I will continue to do while I have breath. I am King Stephen’s
man, and I will not desert him.” “Ah, well!” said Olivier, smiling and
sighing in the same breath. “To tell you truth, now I’ve met you, I expected
nothing less. I would not go from my oath, either. My lord is the empress’s
man, and I am my lord’s man, and if our positions were changed round, my answer
would be the same as yours. Yet there is truth in what I have pleaded. How much
can a people bear? Your labourer in the fields, your little townsman with a
bare living to be looted from him, these would be glad to settle for Stephen or
for Maud, only to be rid of the other. And I do what I am sent out to do, as
well as I can.” “I have no fault to find with the matter
or the manner,” said Hugh. “Where next do you go? Though I hope you will not go
for a day or two, I would know you better, and we have a great deal to talk
over, you and I.” “From here north-east to Stafford, Derby,
Nottingham, and back by the eastern parts. Some will come to terms, as some
lords have done already. Some will hold to their own king, like you. And some
will do as they have done before, go back and forth like a weather-cock with
the wind, and put up their price at every change. No matter, we have done with
that now.” He leaned forward over the table, setting
his wine-cup aside. “I had—I have—another errand of my own, and I should be
glad to stay with you a few days, until I have found what I’m seeking, or made
certain it is not here to be found. Your mention of this flood of pilgrims for
the feast gives me a morsel of hope. A man who wills to be lost could find
cover among so many, all strangers to one another. I am looking for a young man
called Luc Meverel. He has not, to your knowledge, made his way here?” “Not by that name,” said Hugh, interested
and curious. “But a man who willed to be lost might choose to doff his own
name. What’s your need of him?” “Not mine. It’s a lady who wants him back.
You may not have got word, this far north,” said Oliver, “of everything that
happened in Winchester during the council. There was a death there that came
all too near to me. Did you hear of it? King Stephen’s queen sent her clerk
there with a bold challenge to the legate’s authority, and the man was attacked
for his audacity in the street by night, and got off with his life only at the
cost of another life.” “We have indeed heard of it,” said Hugh
with kindling interest. “Abbot Radulfus was there at the council, and brought
back a full report. A knight by the name of Rainald Bossard, who came to the
clerk’s aid when he was set upon. One of those in the service of Laurence
d’Angers, so we heard.” “Who is my lord, also.” “By your good service to his kin at
Bromfield that was plain enough. I thought of you when the abbot spoke of
d’Angers, though I had no name for you then. Then this man Bossard was well
known to you?” “Through a year of service in Palestine,
and the voyage home together. A good man he was, and a good friend to me, and
struck down in defending his honest opponent. I was not with him that night, I
wish I had been, he might yet be alive. But he had only one or two of his own
people, not in arms. There were five or six set on the clerk, it was a wretched
business, confused and in the dark. The murderer got clean away, and has never
been traced. Rainald’s wife… Juliana… I did not know her until we came with our
lord to Winchester, Rainald’s chief manor is nearby. I have learned,” said
Olivier very gravely, “to hold her in the highest regard. She was her lord’s
true match, and no one could say more or better of any lady.” “There is an heir?” asked Hugh. “A man
grown, or still a child?” “No, they never had children. Rainald was
nearly fifty, she cannot be many years younger. And very beautiful,” said
Olivier with solemn consideration, as one attempting not to praise, but to
explain. “Now she’s widowed she’ll have a hard fight on her hands to evade
being married off again—for she’ll want no other after Rainald. She has manors
of her own to bestow. They had thought of the inheritance, the two of them
together, that’s why they took into their household this young man Luc Meverel,
only a year ago. He is a distant cousin of Dame Juliana, twenty-four or
twenty-five years old, I suppose, and landless. They meant to make him their
heir.” He fell silent for some minutes, frowning
past the guttering candles, his chin in his palm. Hugh studied him, and waited.
It was a face worth studying, clean-boned, olive-skinned, fiercely beautiful,
even with the golden, falcon’s eyes thus hooded. The blue-black hair that
clustered thickly about his head, clasping like folded wings, shot sullen
bluish lights back from the candle’s waverings. Daoud, born in Antioch, son of
an English crusading soldier in Robert of Normandy’s following, somehow blown
across the world in the service of an Angevin baron, to fetch up here almost
more Norman than the Normans… The world, thought Hugh, is not so great, after
all, but a man born to venture may bestride it. “I have been three times in that household,”
said Olivier, “but I never knowingly set eyes on this Luc Meverel. All I know
of him is what others have said, but among the others I take my choice which
voice to believe. There is no one, man or woman, in that manor but agrees he
was utterly devoted to Dame Juliana. But as to the manner of his devotion…
There are many who say he loved her far too well, by no means after the fashion
of a son. Again, some say he was equally loyal to Rainald, but their voices are
growing fainter now. Luc was one of those with his lord when Rainald was
stabbed to death in the street. And two days later he vanished from his place,
and has not been seen since.” “Now I begin to see,” said Hugh, drawing
in cautious breath. “Have they gone so far as to say this man slew his lord in
order to gain his lady?” “It is being said now, since his flight.
Who began the whisper there’s no telling, but by this time it’s grown into a
bellow.” “Then why should he run from the prize for
which he had played? It makes poor sense. If he had stayed there need have been
no such whispers.” “Ah, but I think there would have been,
whether he went or stayed. There were those who grudged him his fortune, and
would have welcomed any means of damaging him. They are finding two good
reasons, now, why he should break and run. The first, pure guilt and remorse,
too late to save any one of the three of them. The second, fear—fear that
someone had got wind of his act, and meant to fetch out the truth at all costs.
Either way, a man might break and take to his heels. What you kill for may seem
even less attainable,” said Olivier with rueful shrewdness, “once you have
killed.” “But you have not yet told me,” said Hugh,
“what the lady says of him. Hers is surely a voice that should be heeded.” “She says that such a vile suspicion is
impossible. She did, she does, value her young cousin, but not in the way of
love, nor will she have it that he has ever entertained such thoughts of her.
She says he would have died for his lord, and that it is his lord’s death which
has driven him away, sick with grief, a little mad—who knows how deluded and
haunted? For he was there that night, he saw Rainald die. She is sure of him.
She wants him found and brought back to her. She looks upon him as a son, and
now more than ever she needs him.” “And it’s for her sake you’re seeking him.
But why look for him here, northwards? He may have gone south, west, across the
sea by the Kentish ports. Why to the north?” “Because we have just one word of him
since he was lost from his place, and that was going north on the road to
Newbury. I came by that same way, by Abingdon and Oxford, and I have enquired
for him everywhere, a young man travelling alone. But I can only seek him by
his own name, for I know no other for him. As you say, who knows what he may be
calling himself now!” “And you don’t even know what he looks
like—nothing but merely his age? You’re hunting for a spectre!” “What is lost can always be found, it
needs only enough patience.” Olivier’s hawk’s face, beaked and passionate, did
not suggest patience, but the set of his lips was stubborn and pure in absolute
resolution. “Well, at least,” said Hugh, considering,
“we may go down to see Saint Winifred brought home to her altar, tomorrow, and
Brother Denis can run through the roster of his pilgrims for us, and point out
any who are of the right age and kind, solitary or not. As for strangers here
in the town, I fancy Provost Corviser should be able to put his finger on most
of them. Every man knows every man in Shrewsbury. But the abbey is the more
likely refuge, if he’s here at all.” He pondered, gnawing a thoughtful lip. “I
must send the ring down to the abbot at first light, and let him know what’s
happened to his truant guests, but before I may go down to the feast myself I
must send out a dozen men and have them beat the near reaches of the woods to
westward for our game birds. If they’re over the border, so much the worse for
Wales, and I can do no more, but I doubt if they intend to live wild any longer
than they need. They may not go far. How if I should leave you with the
provost, to pick his brains for your quarry here within the town, while I go
hunting for mine? Then we’ll go down together to see the brothers bring their
saint home, and talk to Brother Denis concerning the list of his guests.” “That would suit me well,” said Olivier
gladly. “I should like to pay my respects to the lord abbot, I do recall seeing
him in Winchester, though he would not notice me. And there was a brother of
that house, if you recall,” he said, his golden eyes veiled within long black
lashes that swept his fine cheekbones, “who was with you at Bromfield and up on
Clee, that time… You must know him well. He is still here at the abbey?” “He is. He’ll be back in his bed now after
Lauds. And you and I had better be thinking of seeking ours, if we’re to be
busy tomorrow.” “He was good to my lord’s young kinsfolk,”
said Olivier. “I should like to see him again.” No need to ask for a name, thought Hugh,
eyeing him with a musing smile. And indeed, should he know the name? He had not
mentioned any, when he spoke of one who was no blood-kin, but who had used him
like a son, one for whose sake he kept a kindness for the Benedictine habit. “You shall!” said Hugh, and rose in high
content to marshal his guest to the bedchamber prepared for him. Chapter Eight ABBOT RADULFUS WAS UP LONG BEFORE PRIME on
the festal morning, and so were his obedientiaries, all of whom had their
important tasks in preparation for the procession. When Hugh’s messenger
presented himself at the abbot’s lodging the dawn was still fresh, dewy and
cool, the light lying brightly across the roofs while the great court lay in
lilac-tinted shadow. In the gardens every tree and bush cast a long band of
shade, striping the flower beds like giant brush-strokes in some gilded
illumination. The abbot received the ring with
astonished pleasure, relieved of one flaw that might have marred the splendour
of the day. “And you say these malefactors were guests in our halls, all four?
We are well rid of them, but if they are armed, as you say, and have taken to
the woods close by, we shall need to warn our travellers, when they leave us.” “My lord Beringar has a company out
beating the edges of the forest for them this moment,” said the messenger.
“There was nothing to gain by following them in the dark, once they were in
cover. But by daylight we’ll hope to trace them. One we have safe in hold, he
may tell us more about them, where they’re from, and what they have to answer
for elsewhere. But at least now they can’t hinder your festivities.” “And for that I’m devoutly thankful. As
this man Ciaran will certainly be for the recovery of his ring.” He added, with
a glance aside at the breviary that lay on his desk, and a small frown for the
load of ceremonial that lay before him for the next few hours: “Shall we not
see the lord sheriff here for Mass this morning?” “Yes, Father, he does intend it, and he
brings a guest also. He had first to set this hunt in motion, but before Mass
they will be here.” “He has a guest?” “An envoy from the empress’s court came
last night, Father. A man of Laurence d’Angers’ household, Olivier de
Bretagne.” The name that had meant nothing to Hugh
meant as little to Radulfus, though he nodded recollection and understanding at
mention of the young man’s overlord. “Then will you say to Hugh Beringar that I
beg he and his guest will remain after Mass, and dine with me here. I should be
glad to make the acquaintance of Messire de Bretagne, and hear his news.” “I will so tell him, Father,” said the
messenger, and forthwith took his leave. Left alone in his parlour, Abbot Radulfus
stood for a moment looking down thoughtfully at the ring in his palm. The
sheltering hand of the bishop-legate would certainly be a powerful protection
to any traveller so signally favoured, wherever there existed any order or
respect for law, whether in England or Wales. Only those already outside the
pale of law, with lives or liberty already forfeit if taken, would defy so
strong a sanction. After this crowning day many of the guests here would be
leaving again for home. He must not forget to give due warning, before they
dispersed, that malefactors might be lurking at large in the woods to westward,
and that they were armed, and all too handy at using their daggers. Best that
the pilgrims should make sure of leaving in companies stout enough to
discourage assault. Meantime, there was satisfaction in
returning to one pilgrim, at least, his particular armour. The abbot rang the little bell that lay
upon his desk, and in a few moments Brother Vitalis came to answer the summons. “Will you enquire at the guest-hall,
brother, for the man called Ciaran, and bid him here to speak with me?” Brother Cadfael had also risen well before
Prime, and gone to open his workshop and kindle his brazier into cautious and
restrained life, in case it should be needed later to prepare tisanes for some
ecstatic souls carried away by emotional excitement, or warm applications for
weaker vessels trampled in the crowd. He was used to the transports of simple
souls caught up in far from simple raptures. He had a few things to tend to, and was
happy to deal with them alone. Young Oswin was entitled to his fill of sleep
until the bell awoke him. Very soon now he would graduate to the hospital of
Saint Giles, where the reliquary of Saint Winifred now lay, and the
unfortunates who carried their contagion with them, and might not be admitted
into the town, could find rest, care and shelter for as long as they needed it.
Brother Mark, that dearly-missed disciple, was gone from there now, already
ordained deacon, his eyes fixed ahead upon his steady goal of priesthood. If
ever he cast a glance over his shoulder, he would find nothing but
encouragement and affection, the proper harvest of the seed he had sown. Oswin
might not be such another, but he was a good enough lad, and would do honestly
by the unfortunates who drifted into his care. Cadfael went down to the banks of the
Meole brook, the westward boundary of the enclave, where the pease fields
declined to the sunken summer water. The rays from the east were just being
launched like lances over the high roofs of the monastic buildings, and
piercing the scattered copses beyond the brook, and the grassy banks on the
further side. This same water, drawn off much higher in its course, supplied
the monastery fish-ponds, the hatchery, and the mill and millpond beyond, and
was fed back into the brook just before it entered the Severn. It lay low
enough now, an archipelago of shoals, half sand, half grass and weed, spreading
smooth islands across its breadth. After this spell, thought Cadfael, we shall
need plenty of rain. But let that wait a day or two. He turned back to climb the slope again.
The earlier field of pease had already been gleaned, the second would be about
ready for harvesting after the festival. A couple of days, and all the
excitement would be over, and the horarium of the house and the cycle of the
seasons would resume their imperturbable progress, two enduring rhythms in the
desperately variable fortunes of mankind. He turned along the path to his
workshop, and there was Melangell hesitating before its closed door. She heard his step in the gravel behind
her, and looked round with a bright, expectant face. The pearly morning light
became her, softened the coarseness of her linen gown, and smoothed cool lilac
shadows round the childlike curves of her face. She had gone to great pains to
prepare herself fittingly for the day’s solemnities. Her skirts were spotless,
crisped out with care, her dark-gold hair, burning with coppery lustre, braided
and coiled on her head in a bright crown, its tight plaits drawing up the skin
of her temples and cheeks so strongly that her brows were pulled aslant, and
the dark-lashed blue eyes elongated and made mysterious. But the radiance that
shone from her came not from the sun’s caresses, but from within. The blue of
those eyes burned as brilliantly as the blue of the gentians Cadfael had seen
long ago in the mountains of southern France, on his way to the east. The ivory
and rose of her cheeks glowed. Melangell was in the highest state of hope,
happiness and expectation. She made him a very pretty reverence,
flushing and smiling, and held out to him the little vial of poppy-syrup he had
given to Rhun three days ago. Still unopened! “If you please, Brother Cadfael, I have
brought this back to you. And Rhun prays that it may serve some other who needs
it more, and with the more force because he has endured without it.” He took it from her gently and held it in
his cupped hand, a crude little vial stopped with a wooden stopper and a
membrane of very thin parchment tied with a waxed thread to seal it. All
intact. The boy’s third night here, and he had submitted to handling and been
mild and biddable in all, but when the means of oblivion was put into his hand
and left to his private use, he had preserved it, and with it some core of his
own secret integrity, at his own chosen cost. God forbid, thought Cadfael, that
I should meddle there. Nothing short of a saint should knock on that door. “You are not angry with him?” asked
Melangell anxiously, but smiling still, unable to believe that any shadow
should touch the day, now that her love had clasped and kissed her. “Because he
did not drink it? It was not that he ever doubted you. He said so to me. He
said—I never quite understand him!—he said it was a time for offering, and he
had his offering prepared.” Cadfael asked: “Did he sleep?” To have
deliverance in hand, even unopened, might well bring peace. “Hush, now, no, how
could I be angry! But did he sleep?” “He says that he did. I think it must be
true, he looks so fresh and young. I prayed hard for him.” With all the force
of her new happiness, loaded with bliss she felt the need to pour out upon all
those near to her. In the conveyance of blessedness by affection Cadfael firmly
believed. “You prayed well,” said Cadfael. “Never
doubt he has gained by it. I’ll keep this for some soul in worse need, as Rhun
says. It will have the virtue of his faith to strengthen it. I shall see you
both during the day.” She went away from him with a light,
springing step and a head reared to breathe in the very space and light of the
sky. And Cadfael went in to make sure he had everything ready to provide for a
long and exhausting day. So Rhun had arrived at the last frontier
of belief, and fallen, or emerged, or soared into the region where the soul
realises that pain is of no account, that to be within the secret of God is
more than well being, and past the power of the tongue to utter. To embrace the
decree of pain is to translate it, to shed it like a rain of blessing on others
who have not yet understood. Who am I, thought Cadfael, alone in the
solitude of his workshop, that I should dare to ask for a sign? If he can
endure and ask nothing, must not I be ashamed of doubting? Melangell passed with a dancing step along
the path from the herbarium. On her right hand the western sky soared, in such
reflected if muted brightness that she could not forbear from turning to stare
into it. A counter-tide of light flowed in here from the west, surging up the
slope from the brook and spilling over the crest into the garden. Somewhere on
the far side of the entire monastic enclave the two tides would meet, and the
light of the west falter, pale and die before the onslaught from the east; but
here the bulk of guest-hall and church cut off the newly-risen sun, and left
the field to this hesitant and soft-treading antidawn. There was someone labouring along the far
border of the flower-garden, going delicately on still tender feet, watching
where he trod. He was alone. No attendant shadow appeared at his back,
yesterday’s magic still held. She was staring at Ciaran, Ciaran without
Matthew. That in itself was a minor miracle, to bring in this day made for
miracles. Melangell watched him begin to descend the
slope towards the brook, and when he was no more than a head and shoulders
black against the brightness, she suddenly turned and went after him. The path
down to the water skirted the growing pease, keeping close to a hedge of thick
bushes above the mill-pool. Halfway down the slope she halted, uncertain
whether to intrude on his solitude. Ciaran had reached the waterside, and stood
surveying what looked like a safe green floor, dappled here and there with the
bleached islands of sand, and studded with a few embedded rocks that stood dry
from three weeks of fine weather. He looked upstream and down, even stepped
into the shallow water that barely covered his naked feet, and surely soothed
and refreshed them. Yet how strange, that he should be here alone! Never, until
yesterday, had she seen either of these two without the other, yet now they
went apart. She was on the point of stealing away to
leave him undisturbed when she saw what he was doing. He had some tiny thing in
his hand, into which he was threading a thin cord, and knotting the cord to
hold it fast. When he raised both hands to make fast the end of his cord to the
tether that held the cross about his neck, the small talisman swung free into
the light and glimmered for an instant in silver, before he tucked it away
within the neck of his shirt, out of sight against his breast. Then she knew
what it was, and stirred in pure pleasure for him, and uttered a small,
breathless sound. For Ciaran had his ring again, the safe-conduct that was to
ensure him passage to his journey’s end. He had heard her, and swung about,
startled and wary. She stood shaken and disconcerted, and then, knowing herself
discovered, ran down the last slope of grass to his side. “They’ve found it for
you!” she said breathlessly, in haste to fill the silence between them and
dispel her own uneasiness at having seemed to spy upon him. “Oh, I am glad! Is
the thief taken, then?” “Melangell!” he said. “You’re early
abroad, too? Yes, you see I am blessed, after all, I have it again. The lord
abbot restored it to me only some minutes ago. But no, the thief is not caught,
he and some fellow-rogues are fled into the woods, it seems. But I can go forth
again without fear now.” His dark eyes, deep-set under thick brows,
opened wide upon her, smiling, holding her charmed in the abrupt discovery that
he was, despite his disease, a young and comely man, who should have been in
the fulness of his powers. Either she was imagining it, or he stood a little
straighter, a little taller, than she had ever yet seen him, and the burning
intensity of his face had mellowed into a brighter, more human ardour, as if
some foreglow of the day’s spiritual radiance had given him new hope. “Melangell,” he said in a soft, vehement rush
of words, “you can’t guess how glad I am of this meeting, it was God sent you
here to me. I’ve long wanted to speak to you alone. Never think that because I
myself am doomed, I can’t see what’s before my eyes concerning others who are
dear to me. I have something to ask of you, to beg of you, most earnestly.
Don’t tell Matthew that I have my ring again!” “Does he not know?” she asked, astray. “No, he was not by when the abbot sent for
me. He must not know! Keep my secret, if you love him—if you have some pity, at
least for me. I have told no one, and you must not. The lord abbot is not
likely to speak of it to any other, why should he? That he would leave to me.
If you and I keep silent, there’s no need for anyone else to find out.” Melangell was lost. She saw him through a
rainbow of starting tears, for very pity of his long face hollowed in shade,
his eyes glowing like the quiet, living heart of a banked fire. “But why? Why do you want to keep it from
him?” “For his sake and yours—yes, and mine! Do
you think I have not understood long ago that he loves you?—that you feel as
much also for him? Only I stand in the way! It’s bitter to know it, and I would
have it changed. My one wish now is that you and he should be happy together.
If he loves me so faithfully, may not I also love him? You know him! He will
sacrifice himself, and you, and all things beside, to finish what he has
undertaken, and see me safe into Aberdaron. I don’t accept his sacrifice, I
won’t endure it! Why should you both be wretched, when my one wish is to go to
my rest in peace of mind and leave my friend happy? Now, while he feels secure
that I dare not set out without the ring, for God’s sake, girl, leave him in
innocence. And I will go, and leave you both my blessing.” Melangell stood quivering, like a leaf
shaken by the soft, vehement wind of his words, uncertain even of her own
heart. “Then what must I do? What is it you want of me?” “Keep my secret,” said Ciaran, “and go
with Matthew in this holy procession. Oh, he’ll go with you, and be glad. He
won’t wonder that I should stay behind and wait the saint’s coming here within
the pale. And while you’re gone, I’ll go on my way. My feet are almost healed,
I have my ring again, I shall reach my haven. You need not be afraid for me.
Only keep him happy as long as you may, and even when my going is known, then
use your arts, keep him, hold him fast. That’s all I shall ever ask of you.” “But he’ll know,” she said, alert to
dangers. “The porter will tell him you’re gone, as soon as he looks for you and
asks.” “No, for I shall go by this way, across
the brook and out to the west, for Wales. The porter will not see me go. See,
it’s barely ankle-deep in this season. I have kinsmen in Wales, the first miles
are nothing. And among so great a throng, if he does look for me, he’ll hardly
wonder at not finding me. Not for hours need he so much as think of me, if you
do your part. You take care of Matthew, I will absolve both you and him of all
care of me, for I shall do well enough. All the better for knowing I leave him
safe with you. For you do love him,” said Ciaran softly. “Yes,” said Melangell in a long sigh. “Then take and hold him, and my blessing
on you both. You may tell him—but well afterwards!—that it is what I designed
and intended,” he said, and suddenly and briefly smiled at some unspoken
thought he did not wish to share with her. “You will really do this for him and for
me? You mean it? You would go on alone for his sake… Oh, you are good!” she
said passionately, and caught at his hand and pressed it to her heart for an
instant, for he was giving her the whole world at his own sorrowful cost, and
for selfless love of his friend, and there might never be any time but this one
moment even to thank him. I’ll never forget your goodness. All my life long I
shall pray for you.” “No,” said Ciaran, the same dark smile
plucking at his lips as she released his hand, “forget me, and help him to
forget me. That is the best gift you can make me. And better you should not
speak to me again. Go and find him. That’s your part, and I depend on you.” She drew back from him a few paces, her
eyes still fixed on him in gratitude and worship, made him a strange little
reverence with head and hands, and turned obediently to climb the field into
the garden. By the time she reached level ground and began to thread the beds
of the rose garden she was breaking into a joyous run. They gathered in the great court as soon
as everyone, monk, lay servant, guest and townsman, had broken his fast. Seldom
had the court seen such a crowd, and outside the walls the Foregate was loud
with voices, as the guildsmen of Shrewsbury, provost, elders and all, assembled
to join the solemn procession that would set out for Saint Giles. Half of the
choir monks, led by Prior Robert, were to go in procession to fetch home the
reliquary, while the abbot and the remaining brothers waited to greet them with
music and candles and flowers on their return. As for the devout of town and
Foregate, and the pilgrims within the walls, they might form and follow Prior
Robert, such of them as were able-bodied and eager, while the lame and feeble
might wait with the abbot, and prove their devotion by labouring out at least a
little way to welcome the saint on her return. “I should so much like to go with them all
the way,” said Melangell, flushed and excited among the chattering, elbowing
crowd in the court. “It is not far. But too far for Rhun—he could not keep
pace.” He was there beside her, very silent, very
white, very fair, as though even his flaxen hair had turned paler at the
immensity of this experience. He leaned on his crutches between his sister and
Dame Alice, and his crystal eyes were very wide, and looked very far, as though
he was not even aware of their solicitude hemming him in on either side. Yet he
answered simply enough, “I should like to go a little way, at least, until they
leave me behind. But you need not wait for me.” “As though I would leave you!” said
Mistress Weaver, comfortably clucking. “You and I will keep together and see
the pilgrimage out to the best we can, and heaven will be content with that.
But the girl has her legs, she may go all the way, and put up a few prayers for
you going and returning, and we’ll none of us be the worse for it.” She leaned to twitch the neck of his shirt
and the collar of his coat into immaculate neatness, and to fuss over his
extreme pallor, afraid he was coming down with illness from over-excitement,
though he seemed tranquil as ivory, and serenely absent in spirit, gone
somewhere she could not follow. Her hand, rough-fingered from weaving, smoothed
his well-brushed hair, teasing every tendril back from his tall forehead. “Run off, then, child,” she said to
Melangell, without turning from the boy. “But find someone we know. There’ll be
riffraff running alongside, I dare say—no escaping them. Stay by Mistress
Glover, or the apothecary’s widow…” “Matthew is going with them,” said
Melangell, flushing and smiling at his very name. “He told me so. I met him
when we came from Prime.” It was only half-true. She had rather
confided boldly to him that she wished to tread every step of the way, and at
every step remember and intercede for the souls she most loved on earth. No
need to name them. He, no doubt, thought with reflected tenderness of her
brother; but she was thinking no less of this anguished pair whose fortunes she
now carried delicately and fearfully in her hands. She had even said, greatly
venturing, “Ciaran cannot keep pace, poor soul, he must wait here, like Rhun.
But can’t we make our steps count for them?” But for all that, Matthew had looked over
his shoulder, and hesitated a sharp instant before he turned his face fully to
her, and said abruptly: “Yes, we’ll go, you and I. Yes, let’s go that short way
together, surely I have the right, this once… I’ll make my prayers for Rhun
every step of the way.” “Trot and find him, then, girl,” said Dame
Alice, satisfied. “Matthew will take good care of you. See, they’re forming up,
you’d best hurry. We’ll be here to watch you come in.” Melangell fled, elated. Prior Robert had
drawn up his choir, with Brother Anselm the precentor at their head, facing the
gate. The shifting, murmuring, excited column of pilgrims formed up at his
rear, twitching like a dragon’s tail, a long, brightly-coloured, volatile
train, brave with flowers, lighted tapers, offerings, crosses and banners.
Matthew was waiting to reach out an eager hand to her and draw her in beside
him. “You have leave? She trusts you to me…?” “You’re not troubled about Ciaran?” she
could not forbear asking anxiously. “He’s right to stay here, he couldn’t
manage the walk.” The choir monks before them began their
processional psalm, Prior Robert led the way through the open gate, and after
him went the brothers in their ordered pairs, and after them the notabilities
of the town, and after them the long retinue of pilgrims, crowding forward
eagerly, picking up the chant where they had knowledge of it or a sensitive
ear, pouring out past the gatehouse and turning right towards Saint Giles. Brother Cadfael went with Prior Robert’s
party, with Brother Adam of Reading walking beside him. Along the broad road by
the enclave wall, past the great triangle of trodden grass at the horse-fair
ground, and again bearing right with the road, between scattered houses and
sun-bleached pastures and fields to the very edge of the suburb, where the
squat tower of the hospital church, the roof of the hospice, and the long
wattle fence of its garden showed dark against the bright eastern sky, slightly
raised from the road on a gentle green mound. And all the way the long train of
followers grew longer and more gaily-coloured, as the people of the Foregate in
their best holiday clothes came out from their dwellings and joined the
procession. There was no room in the small, dark church for more than the
brothers and the civic dignitaries of the town. The rest gathered all about the
doorway, craning to get a glimpse of the proceedings within. With his lips
moving almost soundlessly on the psalms and prayers, Cadfael watched the play
of candle-light on the silver tracery that ornamented Saint Winifred’s elegant
oak coffin, elevated there on the altar as when they had first brought it from
Gwytherin, four years earlier. He wondered whether his motive in securing for
himself a place among the eight brothers who would bear her back to the abbey
had been as pure as he had hoped. Had he been staking a proprietory claim on
her, as one who had been at her first coming? Or had he meant it as a humble
and penitential gesture? He was, after all, past sixty, and as he recalled, the
oak casket was heavy, its edges sharp on a creaky shoulder, and the way back
long enough to bring out all the potential discomforts. She might yet find a
way of showing him whether she approved his proceedings or no, by striking him
helpless with rheumatic pains! The office ended. The eight chosen
brothers, matched in height and pace, lifted the reliquary and settled it upon
their shoulders. The prior stooped his lofty head through the low doorway into
the mid-morning radiance, and the crowd clustered about the church opened to
make way for the saint to ride to her triumph. The procession reformed, Prior
Robert before with the brothers, the coffin with its bearers, flanked by
crosses and banners and candles, and eager women bringing garlands of flowers.
With measured pace, with music and solemn joy, Saint Winifred—or whatever
represented her there in the sealed and secret place—was borne back to her own
altar in the abbey church. Curious, thought Cadfael, carefully
keeping the step by numbers, it seems lighter than I remember. Is that
possible? In only four years? He was familiar with the curious propensities of
the body, dead or alive, he had once been led into a gallery of caverns in the
desert where ancient Christians had lived and died, he knew what dry air can do
to flesh, preserving the light and shrivelled shell while the juice of life was
drawn off into spirit. Whatever was there in the reliquary, it rode tranquilly
upon his shoulder, like a light hand guiding him. It was not heavy at all! Chapter Nine SOMETHING WONDERFUL HAPPENED along the way
to Matthew and Melangell, hemmed in among the jostling, singing, jubilant
train. Somewhere along that half-mile of road they were caught up in the fever
and joy of the day, borne along on the tide of music and devotion, forgetting
all others, forgetting even themselves, drawn into one without any word or
motion of theirs. When they turned their heads to look at each other, they saw
only mated eyes and a halo of sunshine. They did not speak at all, not once
along the way. They had no need of speech. But when they had turned the corner
of the precinct wall by the horse-fair, and drew near to the gatehouse, and
heard and saw the abbot leading his own party out to meet them, splendidly vested
and immensely tall under his mitre; when the two chants found their measure
while yet some way apart, and met and married in a triumphant, soaring cry of
worship, and all the ardent followers drew gasping breaths of exultation,
Melangell heard beside her a broken breath drawn, like a soft sob, that turned
as suddenly into a peal of laughter, out of pure, possessed joy. Not a loud
sound, muted and short of breath because the throat that uttered it was
clenched by emotion, and the mind and heart from which it came quite unaware of
what it shed upon the world. It was a beautiful sound, or so Melangell thought,
as she raised her head to stare at him with wide eyes and parted lips, in
dazzled and dazzling delight. Matthew’s wry and rare smile she had seen sometimes,
and wondered and grieved at its brevity, but never before had she heard him
laugh. The two processions merged. The
cross-bearers walked before, Abbot Radulfus, prior and choir monks came after,
and Cadfael and his peers with their sacred burden followed, hemmed in on both
sides by worshippers who reached and leaned to touch even the sleeve of a
bearer’s habit, or the polished oak of the reliquary as it passed. Brother
Anselm, in secure command of his choir, raised his own fine voice in the lead
as they turned in at the gatehouse, bringing Saint Winifred home. Brother Cadfael, by then, was moving like
a man in a dual dream, his body keeping pace and time with his fellows, in one
confident rhythm, while his mind soared in another, carried aloft on the cushioned
cloud of sounds, compounded of the eager footsteps, exalted murmurs and shrill
acclamations of hundreds of people, with the chant borne above it, and the
voice of Brother Anselm soaring over all. The great court was crowded with
people to watch them enter, the way into the cloister, and so into the church,
had to be cleared by slow, shuffling paces, the ranks pressing back to give
them passage, Cadfael came to himself with some mild annoyance when the
reliquary was halted in the court, to wait for a clear path ahead. He braced
both feet almost aggressively into the familiar soil, and for the first time
looked about him. He saw, beyond the throng already gathered, the saint’s own
retinue melting and flowing to find a place where eye might see all, and ear
hear all. In this brief halt he saw Melangell and Matthew, hand in hand, hunt
round the fringes of the crowd, and find a place to gaze. They looked to Cadfael a little tipsy,
like unaccustomed drinkers after strong wine. And why not? After long abstention
he had felt the intoxication possessing his own feet, as they held the hypnotic
rhythm, and his own mind, as it floated on the cadences of song. Those
ecstasies were at once native and alien to him, he could both embrace and stand
clear of them, feet firmly planted, gripping the homely earth, to keep his
balance and stand erect. They moved forward again into the nave of
the church, and then to the right, towards the bared and waiting altar. The
vast, dreaming, sun-warmed bulk of the church enclosed them, dim, silent and
empty, since no other could enter until they had discharged their duty, lodged
their patroness and retired to their own insignificant places. Then they came,
led by abbot and prior, first the brothers to fill up their stalls in the choir,
then the provost and guildsmen of the town and the notables of the shire, and
then all that great concourse of people, flooding in from hot mid-morning
sunlight to the cool dimness of stone, and from the excited clamour of festival
to the great silence of worship, until all the space of the nave was filled
with the colour and warmth and breath of humanity, and all as still as the
candle-flames on the altar. Even the reflected gleams in the silver chacings of
the casket were fixed and motionless as jewels. Abbot Radulfus stood forth. The sobering
solemnity of the Mass began. For the very intensity of all that mortal
emotion gathered thus between confining walls and beneath one roof, it was
impossible to withdraw the eyes for an instant from the act of worship on which
it was centred, or the mind from the words of the office. There had been times,
through the years of his vocation, when Cadfael’s thoughts had strayed during
Mass to worrying at other problems, and working out other intents. It was not
so now. Throughout, he was unaware of a single face in all that throng, only of
the presence of humankind, in whom his own identity was lost; or, perhaps, into
whom his own identity expanded like air, to fill every part of the whole. He
forgot Melangell and Matthew, he forgot Ciaran and Rhun, he never looked round
to see if Hugh had come. If there was a face before his mind’s eye at all it
was one he had never seen, though he well remembered the slight and fragile
bones he had lifted with such care and awe out of the earth, and with so much
better heart again laid beneath the same soil, there to resume her
hawthorn-scented sleep under the sheltering trees. For some reason, though she
had lived to a good old age, he could not imagine her older than seventeen or eighteen,
as she had been when the king’s son Cradoc pursued her. The slender little
bones had cried out of youth, and the shadowy face he had imagined for her was
fresh and eager and open, and very beautiful. But he saw it always half turned
away from him. Now, if ever, she might at last look round, and show him fully
that reassuring countenance. At the end of Mass the abbot withdrew to
his own stall, to the right of the entrance from nave to choir, round the
parish altar, and with lifted voice and open arms bade the pilgrims advance to
the saint’s altar, where everyone who had a petition to make might make it on
his knees, and touch the reliquary with hand and lip. And in orderly and
reverent silence they came. Prior Robert took his stand at the foot of the three
steps that led up to the altar, ready to offer a hand to those who needed help
to mount or kneel. Those who were in health and had no pressing requirements to
advance came through from the nave on the other side, and found corners where
they might stand and watch, and miss nothing of this memorable day. They had
faces again, they spoke in whispers, they were as various as an hour since they
had been one. On his knees in his stall, Brother Cadfael
looked on, knowing them one from another now as they came, kneeled and touched.
The long file of petitioners was drawing near its end when he saw Rhun
approaching. Dame Alice had a hand solicitously under his left elbow, Melangell
nursed him along on his right, Matthew followed close, no less anxious than they.
The boy advanced with his usual laborious gait, his dragging toe just scraping
the tiles of the floor. His face was intensely pale, but with a brilliant
pallor that almost dazzled the watching eyes, and the wide gaze he fixed
steadily upon the reliquary shone translucent, like ice with a bright bluish
light behind it. Dame Alice was whispering low, encouraging entreaties into one
ear, Melangell into the other, but he was aware of nothing but the altar
towards which he moved. When his turn came, he shook off his supporters, and
for a moment seemed to hesitate before venturing to advance alone. Prior Robert observed his condition, and
held out a hand. “You need not be abashed, my son, because you cannot kneel.
God and the saint will know your goodwill.” The softest whisper of a voice, though
clearly audible in the waiting silence, said tremulously: “But, Father, I can!
I will!” Rhun straightened up, taking his hands
from his crutches, which slid from under his armpits and fell. That on the left
crashed with an unnerving clatter upon the tiles, on the right Melangell
started forward and dropped to her knees, catching the falling prop in her arms
with a faint cry. And there she crouched, embracing the discarded thing
desperately, while Rhun set his twisted foot to the ground and stood upright.
He had but two or three paces to go to the foot of the altar steps. He took
them slowly and steadily, his eyes fixed upon the reliquary. Once he lurched
slightly, and Dame Alice made a trembling move to run after him, only to halt
again in wonder and fear, while Prior Robert again extended his hand to offer
aid. Rhun paid no attention to them or to anyone else, he did not seem to see
or hear anything but his goal, and whatever voice it might be that called him
forward. For he went with held breath, as a child learning to walk ventures
across perilous distances to reach its mother’s open arms and coaxing, praising
blandishments that wooed it to the deed. It was the twisted foot he set first on
the lowest step, and now the twisted foot, though a little awkward and
unpractised, was twisted no longer, and did not fail him, and the wasted leg,
as he put his weight on it, seemed to have smoothed out into shapeliness, and
bore him up bravely. Only then did Cadfael become aware of the
stillness and the silence, as if every soul present held his breath with the
boy, spellbound, not yet ready, not yet permitted to acknowledge what they saw
before their eyes. Even Prior Robert stood charmed into a tall, austere statue,
frozen at gaze. Even Melangell, crouching with the crutch hugged to her breast,
could not stir a finger to help or break the spell, but hung upon every
deliberate step with agonised eyes, as though she were laying her heart under
his feet as a voluntary sacrifice to buy off fate. He had reached the third step, he sank to
his knees with only the gentlest of manipulations, holding by the fringes of
the altar frontal, and the cloth of gold that was draped under the reliquary.
He lifted his joined hands and starry face, white and bright even with eyes now
closed, and though there was hardly any sound they saw his lips moving upon
whatever prayers he had made ready for her. Certainly they contained no request
for his own healing. He had put himself simply in her hands, submissively and
joyfully, and what had been done to him and for him surely she had done, of her
own perfect will. He had to hold by her draperies to rise,
as babes hold by their mothers’ skirts. No doubt but she had him under the arms
to raise him. He bent his fair head and kissed the hem of her garment, rose
erect and kissed the silver rim of the reliquary, in which, whether she lay or
not, she alone commanded and had sovereignty. Then he withdrew from her,
feeling his way backward down the three steps. Twisted foot and shrunken leg
carried him securely. At the foot he made obeisance gravely, and then turned
and went briskly, like any other healthy lad of sixteen, to smile reassurance
on his trembling womenfolk, take up gently the crutches for which he had no
further use, and carry them back to lay them tidily under the altar. The spell broke, for the marvellous thing
was done, and its absolute nature made manifest. A great, shuddering sigh went
round nave, choir, transepts and all, wherever there were human creatures watching
and listening. And after the sigh the quivering murmur of a gathering storm,
whether of tears or laughter there was no telling, but the air shook with its
passion. And then the outcry, the loosing of both tears and laughter, in a gale
of wonder and praise. From stone walls and lofty, arched roof, from rood-loft
and transept arcades, the echoes flew and rebounded, and the candles that had
stood so still and tall shook and guttered in the gale. Melangell hung weak
with weeping and joy in Matthew’s arms, Dame Alice whirled from friend to
friend, spouting tears like a fountain, and smiling like the most blessed of
women. Prior Robert lifted his hands in vindicated stewardship, and his voice
in the opening of a thanksgiving psalm, and Brother Anselm took up the chant. A miracle, a miracle, a miracle… And in the midst Rhun stood erect and
still, even a little bewildered, braced sturdily on his two long, shapely legs,
looking all about him at the shouting, weeping, exulting faces, letting the
meaningless sounds wash over him in waves, wanting the quiet he had known when
there had been no one here in this holy place but himself and his saint, who
had told him, in how sweet and private conference, all that he had to do. Brother Cadfael rose with his brothers,
after the church was cleared of all others, after all that jubilant, bubbling,
boiling throng had gone forth to spill its feverish excitement in open summer
air, to cry the miracle aloud, carry it out into the Foregate, beyond into the
town, buffet it back and forth across the tables at dinner in the guest-hall,
and return to extol it at Vespers with what breath was left. When they
dispersed the word would go with them wherever they went, sounding Saint
Winifred’s praises, inspiring other souls to take to the roads and bring their
troubles to Shrewsbury. Where healing was proven, and attested by hundreds of
voices. The brothers went to their modest,
accustomed dinner in the refectory, and observed, whatever their own feelings
were, the discipline of silence. They were very tired, which made silence
welcome. They had risen early, worked hard, been through fire and flood body
and soul, no wonder they ate humbly, thankfully, in silence. Chapter Ten IT WAS NOT UNTIL DINNER was almost over in
the guest-hall that Matthew, seated at Melangell’s side and still flushed and
exalted from the morning’s heady wonders, suddenly bethought him of sterner
matters, and began to look back with a thoughtful frown which as yet only
faintly dimmed the unaccustomed brightness of his face. Being in attendance on
Mistress Weaver and her young people had made him a part, for a while, of their
unshadowed joy, and caused him to forget everything else. But it could not
last, though Rhun sat there half-lost in wonder still, with hardly a word to
say, and felt no need of food or drink, and his womenfolk fawned on him
unregarded. So far away had he been that the return took time. “I haven’t seen Ciaran,” said Matthew
quietly in Melangell’s ear, and he rose a little in his place to look round the
crowded room. “Did you catch ever a glimpse of him in the church?” She, too, had forgotten until then, but at
sight of his face she remembered all too sharply, with a sickening lurch of her
heart. But she kept her countenance, and laid a persuasive hand on his arm to
draw him down again beside her. “Among so many? But he surely would be there.
He must have been among the first, he stayed here, he would find a good place.
We didn’t see all those who went to the altar—we all stayed with Rhun, and his place
was far back.” Such a mingling of truth and lies, but she kept her voice
confident, and clung to her shaken hope. “But where is he now? I don’t see him
within here.” Though there was so much excitement, so much moving about from
table to table to talk with friends, that one man might easily avoid detection.
“I must find him,” said Matthew, not yet greatly troubled but wanting
reassurance, and rose. “No, sit down! You know he must be here
somewhere. Let him alone, and he’ll appear when he chooses. He may be resting
on his bed, if he has to go forth again barefoot tomorrow. Why look for him
now? Can you not do without him even one day? And such a day?” Matthew looked down at her with a face
from which all the openness and joy had faded, and freed his sleeve from her
grasp gently enough, but decidedly. “Still, I must find him. Stay here with
Rhun, I’ll come back. All I want is to see him, to be sure…” He was away, slipping quietly out between
the festive tables, looking sharply about him as he went. She was in two minds
about following him, but then she thought better of it, for while he hunted
time would be slipping softly away, and Ciaran would be dwindling into
distance, as later she prayed he could fade even out of mind, and be forgotten.
So she remained with the happy company, but not of it, and with every passing
moment hesitated whether to grow more reassured or more uneasy. At last she
could not bear the waiting any longer. She rose quietly and slipped away. Dame
Alice was in full spate, torn between tears and smiles, sitting proudly by her
prodigy, and surrounded by neighbours as happy and voluble as herself, and
Rhun, still somehow apart though he was the centre of the group, sat withdrawn
into his revelation, even as he answered eager questions, lamely enough but as
well as he could. They had no need of Melangell, they would not miss her for a
little while. When she came out into the great court,
into the brilliance of the noonday sun, it was the quietest hour, the pause
after meat. There never was a time of day when there was no traffic about the
court, no going and coming at the gatehouse, but now it moved at its gentlest
and quietest. She went down almost fearfully into the cloister, and found no
one there but a single copyist busy reviewing what he had done the previous
day, and Brother Anselm in his workshop going over the music for Vespers; into
the stable-yard, though there was no reason in the world why Matthew should be
there, having no mount, and no expectation that his companion would or possibly
could acquire one; into the gardens, where a couple of novices were clipping
back the too exuberant shoots of a box hedge; even into the grange court, where
the barns and storehouses were, and a few lay servants were taking their ease,
and harrowing over the morning’s marvel, like everyone else within the enclave,
and most of Shrewsbury and the Foregate into the bargain. The abbot’s garden
was empty, neat, glowing with carefully-tended roses, his lodging showed an
open door, and some ordered bustle of guests within. She turned back towards the garden, now in
deep anxiety. She was not good at lying, she had no practice, even for a good
end she could not but botch the effort. And for all the to and fro of customary
commerce within the pale, never without work to be done, she had seen nothing
of Matthew. But he could not be gone, no, the porter could tell him nothing,
Ciaran had not passed there; and she would not, never until she must, never
until Matthew’s too fond heart was reconciled to loss, and open and receptive
to a better gain. She turned back, rounding the box hedge
and out of sight of the busy novices, and walked breast to breast into Matthew. They met between the thick hedges, in a
terrible privacy. She started back from him in a brief revulsion of guilt, for
he looked more distant and alien than ever before, even as he recognised her,
and acknowledged with a contortion of his troubled face her right to come out
in search of him, and almost in the same instant frowned her off as irrelevant. “He’s gone!” he said in a chill and
grating voice, and looked through her and far beyond. “God keep you, Melangell,
you must fend for yourself now, sorry as I am. He’s gone, fled while my back
was turned. I’ve looked for him everywhere, and never a trace of him. Nor has
the porter seen him pass the gate, I’ve asked there. But he’s gone! Alone! And
I must go after him. God keep you, girl, as I cannot, and fare you well!” And he was going so, with so few words and
so cold and wild a face! He had turned on his heel and taken two long steps
before she flung herself after him, caught him by the arms in both hands, and
dragged him to a halt. “No, no, why? What need has he of you, to
match with my need? He’s gone? Let him go! Do you think your life belongs to
him? He doesn’t want it! He wants you free, he wants you to live your own life,
not die his death with him. He knows, he knows you love me! Dare you deny it?
He knows I love you. He wants you happy! Why should not a friend want his
friend to be happy? Who are you to deny him his last wish?” She knew by then that she had said too
much, but never knew at what point the error had become mortal. He had turned
fully to her again, and frozen where he stood, and his face was like chiselled
marble. He tugged his sleeve out of her grasp this time with no gentleness at
all. “He wants!” hissed a voice she had never
heard before, driven through narrowed lips. “You’ve spoken with him! You speak
for him! You knew! You knew he meant to go, and leave me here bewitched,
damned, false to my oath. You knew! When? When did you speak with him?” He had her by the wrists, he shook her
mercilessly, and she cried out and fell to her knees. “You knew he meant to go?” persisted
Matthew, stooping over her in a cold frenzy. “Yes, yes! This morning he told me… he
wished it…” “He wished it! How dared he wish it? How
could he dare, robbed of his bishop’s ring as he was? He dared not stir without
it, he was terrified to set foot outside the pale…” “He has the ring,” she cried, abandoning
all deceit. “The lord abbot gave it back to him this morning, you need not fret
for him, he’s safe enough, he has his protection… He doesn’t need you!” Matthew had fallen into a deadly
stillness, stooping above her. “He has the ring? And you knew it, and never
said word! If you know so much, how much more do you know. Speak! Where is he?” “Gone,” she said in a trembling whisper,
“and wished you well, wished us both well… wished us to be happy… Oh, let him
go, let him go, he sets you free!” Something that was certainly a laugh
convulsed Matthew, she heard it with her ears and felt it shiver through her
flesh, but it was like no other laughter she had ever heard, it chilled her
blood. “He sets me free! And you must be his confederate! Oh, God! He never
passed the gate. If you know all, then tell all—how did he go?” She faltered, weeping: “He loved you, he
willed you to live and forget him, and be happy…” “How did he go?” repeated Matthew, in a
voice so ill-supplied with breath it seemed he might strangle on the words. “Across the brook,” she said in a broken
whisper, “making the quickest way for Wales. He said… he has kin there…” He drew in hissing breath and took his
hands from her, leaving her drooping forward on her face as he let go of her
wrists. He had turned his back and flung away from her, all they had shared
forgotten, his obsession plucking him away. She did not understand, there was
no way she could come to terms so rapidly with all that had happened, but she
knew she had loosed her hold of her love, and he was in merciless flight from
her in pursuit of some incomprehensible duty in which she had no part and no
right. She sprang up and ran after him, caught
him by the arm, wound her own arms about him, lifted her imploring face to his
stony, frantic stare, and prayed him passionately: “Let him go! Oh, let him go!
He wants to go alone and leave you to me…” Almost silently above her the terrible
laughter, so opposed to that lovely sound as he followed the reliquary with
her, boiled like some thick, choking syrup in his throat. He struggled to shake
off her clinging hands, and when she fell to her knees again and hung upon him
with all her despairing weight he tore loose his right hand, and struck her
heavily in the face, sobbing, and so wrenched himself loose and fled, leaving
her face-down on the ground. In the abbot’s lodging Radulfus and his
guests sat long over their meal, for they had much to discuss. The topic which
was on everyone’s lips naturally came first. “It would seem,” said the abbot, “that we
have been singularly favoured this morning. Certain motions of grace we have
seen before, but never yet one so public and so persuasive, with so many
witnesses. How do you say? I grow old in experience of wonders, some of which
turn out to fall somewhat short of their promise. I know of human deception,
not always deliberate, for sometimes the deceiver is himself deceived. If
saints have power, so have demons. Yet this boy seems to me as crystal. I
cannot think he either cheats or is cheated.” “I have heard,” said Hugh, “of cripples
who discarded their crutches and walked without them, only to relapse when the
fervour of the occasion was over. Time will prove whether this one takes to his
crutches again.” “I shall speak with him later,” said the
abbot, “after the excitement has cooled. I hear from Brother Edmund that
Brother Cadfael has been treating the boy these three days he has been here.
That may have eased his condition, but it can scarcely have brought about so
sudden a cure. No, I must say it, I truly believe our house has been the happy
scene of divine grace. I will speak also with Cadfael, who must know the boy’s
condition.” Olivier sat quiet and deferential in the
presence of so reverend a churchman as the abbot, but Hugh observed that his
arched lids lifted and his eyes kindled at Cadfael’s name. So he knew who it
was he sought, and something more than a distant salute in action had passed
between that strangely assorted pair. “And now I should be glad,” said the
abbot, “to hear what news you bring from the south. Have you been in
Westminster with the empress’s court? For I hear she is now installed there.” Olivier gave his account of affairs in
London readily, and answered questions with goodwill. “My lord has remained in
Oxford, it was at his wish I undertook this errand. I was not in London, I set
out from Winchester. But the empress is in the palace of Westminster, and the
plans for her coronation go forward, admittedly very slowly. The city of London
is well aware of its power, and means to exact due recognition of it, or so it
seems to me.” He would go no nearer than that to voicing whatever qualms he
felt about his liege lady’s wisdom or want of it, but he jutted a dubious
underlip, and momentarily frowned. “Father, you were there at the council, you
know all that happened. My lord lost a good knight there, and I a valued
friend, struck down in the street.” “Rainald Bossard,” said Radulfus sombrely.
“I have not forgotten.” “Father, I have been telling the lord
sheriff here what I should like to tell also to you. For I have a second errand
to pursue, wherever I go on the business of the empress, an errand for
Rainald’s widow. Rainald had a young kinsman in his household, who was with him
when he was killed, and after that death this young man left the lady’s service
without a word, secretly. She says he had grown closed and silent even before
he vanished, and the only trace of him afterwards was on the road to Newbury,
going north. Since then, nothing. So knowing I was bound north, she begged me
to enquire for him wherever I came, for she values and trusts him, and needs
him at her side. I may not deceive you, Father, there are those who say he has
fled because he is guilty of Rainald’s death. They claim he was besotted with
Dame Juliana, and may have seized his chance in this brawl to widow her, and
get her for himself, and then taken fright because these things were so soon
being said. But I think they were not being said at all until after he had
vanished. And Juliana, who surely knows him better than any, and looks upon him
as a son, for want of children of her own, she is quite sure of him. She wants
him home and vindicated, for whatever reason he left her as he did. And I have
been asking at every lodging and monastery along the road for word of such a
young man. May I also ask here? Brother Hospitaller will know the names of all
his guests. Though a name,” he added ruefully, “is almost all I have, for if
ever I saw the man it was without knowing it was he. And the name he may have
left behind him.” “It is not much to go on,” said Abbot
Radulfus with a smile, “but certainly you may enquire. If he has done no wrong,
I should be glad to help you to find him and bring him off without reproach.
What is his name?” “Luc Meverel. Twenty-four years old, they
tell me, middling tall and well made, dark of hair and eye.” “It could fit many hundreds of young men,”
said the abbot, shaking his head, “and the name I doubt he will have put off if
he has anything to hide, or even if he fears it may be unfairly besmirched. Yet
try. I grant you in such a gathering as we have here now a young man who wished
to be lost might bury himself very thoroughly. Denis will know which of his
guests is of the right age and quality. For clearly your Luc Meverel is
well-born, and most likely tutored and lettered.” “Certainly so,” said Olivier. “Then by all means, and with my blessing,
go freely to Brother Denis, and see what he can do to help you. He has an
excellent memory, he will be able to tell you which, among the men here, is of
suitable years, and gentle. You can but try.” On leaving the lodging they went first,
however, to look for Brother Cadfael. And Brother Cadfael was not so easily
found. Hugh’s first resort was the workshop in the herbarium, where they
habitually compounded their affairs. But there was no Cadfael there. Nor was he
with Brother Anselm in the cloister, where he well might have been debating
some nice point in the evening’s music. Nor checking the medicine cupboard in
the infirmary, which must surely have been depleted during these last few days,
but had clearly been restocked in the early hours of this day of glory. Brother
Edmund said mildly: “He was here. I had a poor soul who bled from the mouth,
too gorged, I think, with devotion. But he’s quiet and sleeping now, the flux
has stopped. Cadfael went away some while since.” Brother Oswin, vigorously fighting weeds
in the kitchen garden, had not seen his superior since dinner. “But I think,”
he said, blinking thoughtfully into the sun in the zenith, “he may be in the
church.” Cadfael was on his knees at the foot of
Saint Winifred’s three-tread stairway to grace, his hands not lifted in prayer
but folded in the lap of his habit, his eyes not closed in entreaty but wide
open to absolution. He had been kneeling there for some time, he who was
usually only too glad to rise from knees now perceptibly stiffening. He felt no
pains, no griefs of any kind, nothing but an immense thankfulness in which he
floated like a fish in an ocean. An ocean as pure and blue and drowningly deep and
clear as that well-remembered eastern sea, the furthest extreme of the tideless
midland sea of legend, at the end of which lay the holy city of Jerusalem, Our
Lord’s burial-place and hard-won kingdom. The saint who presided here, whether
she lay here or no, had launched him into a shining infinity of hope. Her
mercies might be whimsical, they were certainly magisterial. She had reached
her hand to an innocent, well deserving her kindness. What had she intended
towards this less innocent but no less needy being? Behind him, approaching quietly from the
nave, a known voice said softly: “And are you demanding yet a second miracle?” He withdrew his eyes reluctantly from the
reflected gleams of silver along the reliquary, and turned to look towards the
parish altar. He saw the expected shape of Hugh Beringar, the thin dark face
smiling at him. But over Hugh’s shoulder he saw a taller head and shoulders
loom, emerging from dimness in suave, resplendent planes, the bright, jutting
cheekbones, the olive cheeks smoothly hollowed below, the falcon’s amber eyes
beneath high-arched black brows, the long, supple lips tentatively smiling upon
him. It was not possible. Yet he beheld it.
Olivier de Bretagne came out of the shadows and stepped unmistakable into the
light of the altar candles. And that was the moment when Saint Winifred turned
her head, looked fully into the face of her fallible but faithful servant, and
also smiled. A second miracle! Why not? When she gave
she gave prodigally, with both hands. Chapter Eleven THEY WENT OUT INTO THE CLOISTER all three
together, and that in itself was memorable and good, for they had never been
together before. Those trusting intimacies which had once passed between
Cadfael and Olivier, on a winter night in Bromfield priory, were unknown still
to Hugh, and there was a mysterious constraint still that prevented Olivier
from openly recalling them. The greetings they exchanged were warm but brief,
only the reticence behind them was eloquent, and no doubt Hugh understood that
well enough, and was willing to wait for enlightenment, or courteously to make
do without it. For that there was no haste, but for Luc Meverel there might be. “Our friend has a quest,” said Hugh, “in
which we mean to enlist Brother Denis’s help, but we shall also be very glad of
yours. He is looking for a young man by the name of Luc Meverel, strayed from
his place and known to be travelling north. Tell him the way of it, Olivier.” Olivier told the story over again, and was
listened to with close attention. “Very gladly,” said Cadfael then, “would I do
whatever man can do not only to bring off an innocent man from such a charge,
but also to bring the charge home to the guilty. We know of this murder, and it
sticks in every gullet that a decent man, protecting his honourable opponent,
should be cut down by one of his own faction…” “Is that certain?” wondered Hugh sharply. “As good as certain. Who else would so
take exception to the man standing up for his lady and doing his errand without
fear? All who still held to Stephen in their hearts would approve, even if they
dared not applaud him. And as for a chance attack by sneak-thieves, why choose
to prey on a mere clerk, with nothing of value on him but the simple needs of
his journey, when the town was full of nobles, clerics and merchants far better
worth robbing? Rainald died only because he came to the clerk’s aid. No, an
adherent of the empress, like Rainald himself but most unlike, committed that
infamy.” “That’s good sense,” agreed Olivier. “But
my chief concern now is to find Luc, and send him home again if I can.” “There must be twenty or more young
fellows in that age here today,” said Cadfael, scrubbing thoughtfully at his
blunt brown nose, “but I dare wager most of them can be pricked out of the list
as well known to some of their companions by their own right names, or by
reason of their calling or condition. Solitaries may come, but they’re few and
far between. Pilgrims are like starlings, they thrive on company. We’d best go
and talk to Brother Denis. He’ll have sorted out most of them by now.” Brother Denis had a retentive memory and
an appetite for news and rumours that usually kept him the best-informed person
in the enclave. The fuller his halls, the more pleasure he took in knowing
everything that went on there, and the name and vocation of every guest. He
also kept meticulous books to record the visitations. They found him in the narrow cell where he
kept his accounts and estimated his future needs, thoughtfully reckoning up
what provisions he still had, and how rapidly the demands on them were likely
to dwindle from the morrow. He took his mind from his store-book courteously in
order to listen to what Brother Cadfael and the sheriff required of him, and
produced answers with exemplary promptitude when asked to sieve out from his
swollen household males of about twenty-five years, bred gentle or within
modest reach of gentility, lettered, of dark colouring and medium tall build,
answering to the very bare description of Luc Meverel. As his forefinger flew
down the roster of his guests the numbers shrank remarkably. It seemed to be
true that considerably more than half of those who went on pilgrimage were
women, and that among the men the greater part were in their forties or
fifties, and of those remaining, many would be in minor orders, either
monastics or secular priests or would-be priests. And Luc Meverel was none of
these. “Are there any here,” asked Hugh, viewing
the final list, which was short enough, “who came solitary?” Brother Denis cocked his round, rosy,
tonsured head aside and ran a sharp brown eye, very remiscent of a robin’s,
down the list. “Not one. Young squires of that age seldom go as pilgrims,
unless with an exigent lord—or an equally exigent lady. In such a summer feast
as this we might have young friends coming together, to take the fill of the
time before they settle down to sterner disciplines. But alone… Where would be
the pastime in that?” “Here are two, at any rate,” said Cadfael,
“who came together, but surely not for pastime. They have puzzled me, I own.
Both are of the proper age, and such word as we have of the man we’re looking
for would fit either. You know them, Denis, that youngster who’s on his way to
Aberdaron, and his friend who bears him company. Both lettered, both bred to
the manor. And certainly they came from the south, beyond Abingdon, according
to Brother Adam of Reading, who lodged there the same night.” “Ah, the barefoot traveller,” said Denis,
and laid a finger on Ciaran in the shrunken toll of young men, “and his keeper
and worshipper. Yes, I would not put half a year between them, and they have
the build and colouring, but you needed only one.” “We could at least look at two,” said
Cadfael. “If neither of them is what we’re seeking, yet coming from that region
they may have encountered such a single traveller somewhere on the road. If we
have not the authority to question them closely about who they are and whence
they come, and how and why thus linked, then Father Abbot has. And if they have
no reason to court concealment, then they’ll willingly declare to him what they
might not as readily utter to us.” “We may try it,” said Hugh, kindling. “At
least it’s worth the asking, and if they have nothing to do with the man we are
looking for, neither they nor we have lost more than half an hour of time, and
surely they won’t grudge us that.” “Granted what is so far related of these
two hardly fits the case,” Cadfael acknowledged doubtfully, “for the one is
said to be mortally ill and going to Aberdaron to die, and the other is
resolute to keep him company to the end. But a young man who wishes to
disappear may provide himself with a circumstantial story as easily as with a
new name. And at all events, between Abingdon and Shrewsbury it’s possible they
may have encountered Luc Meverel alone and under his own name.” “But if one of these two, either of these
two, should truly be the man I want,” said Olivier doubtfully, “then who, in
the name of God, is the other?” “We ask each other questions,” said Hugh
practically, “which either of these two could answer in a moment. Come, let’s
leave Abbot Radulfus to call them in, and see what comes of it.” It was not difficult to induce the abbot
to have the two young men sent for. It was not so easy to find them and bring
them to speak for themselves. The messenger, sent forth in expectation of
prompt obedience, came back after a much longer time than had been expected,
and reported ruefully that neither of the pair could be found within the abbey
walls. True, the porter had not actually seen either of them pass the
gatehouse. But what had satisfied him that the two were leaving was that the
young man Matthew had come, no long time after dinner, to reclaim his dagger,
and had left behind him a generous gift of money to the house, saying that he
and his friend were already bound away on their journey, and desired to offer
thanks for their lodging. And had he seemed, it was Cadfael who asked it,
himself hardly knowing why, had he seemed as he always was, or in any way
disturbed or alarmed or out of countenance and temper, when he came for his
weapon and paid his and his friend’s score? The messenger shook his head, having asked
no such question at the gate. Brother Porter, when enquiry was made direct by
Cadfael himself, said positively: “He was like a man on fire. Oh, as soft as
ever in voice, and courteous, but pale and alight, you’d have said his hair
stood on end. But what with every soul within here wandering in a dream, since
this wonder, I never thought but here were some going forth with the news while
the furnace was still white-hot.” “Gone?” said Olivier, dismayed, when this
word was brought back to the abbot’s parlour. “Now I begin to see better cause
why one of these two, for all they come so strangely paired, and so strangely
account for themselves, may be the man I’m seeking. For if I do not know Luc
Meverel by sight, I have been two or three times his lord’s guest recently, and
he may well have taken note of me. How if he saw me come, today, and is gone
hence thus in haste because he does not wish to be found? He could hardly know
I am sent to look for him, but he might, for all that, prefer to put himself
clean out of sight. And an ailing companion on the way would be good cover for
a man wanting a reason for his wanderings. I wish I might yet speak with these
two. How long have they been gone?” “It cannot have been more than an hour and
a half after noon,” said Cadfael, “according to when Matthew reclaimed his
dagger.” “And afoot!” Olivier kindled hopefully.
“And even unshod, the one of them! It should be no great labour to overtake
them, if it’s known what road they will have taken.” “By far their best way is by the Oswestry
road, and so across the dyke into Wales. According to Brother Denis, that was
Ciaran’s declared intent.” “Then, Father Abbot,” said Olivier
eagerly, “with your leave I’ll mount and ride after them, for they cannot have
got far. It would be a pity to miss the chance, and even if they are not what
I’m seeking, neither they nor I will have lost anything. But with or without my
man, I shall return here.” “I’ll ride through the town with you,”
said Hugh, “and set you on your way, for this will be new country to you. But
then I must be about my own business, and see if we’ve gathered any harvest
from this morning’s hunt. I doubt they’ve gone deeper into the forest, or I
should have had word by now. We shall look for you back before night, Olivier.
One more night at the least we mean to keep you and longer if we can.” Olivier took his leave hastily but
gracefully, made a dutiful reverence to the abbot, and turned upon Brother
Cadfael a brief, radiant smile that shattered his preoccupation for an instant
like a sunburst through clouds. “I will not leave here,” he said in simple
reassurance, “without having quiet conference with you. But this I must see
finished, if I can.” They were gone away briskly to the
stables, where they had left their horses before Mass. Abbot Radulfus looked
after them with a very thoughtful face. “Do you find it surprising, Cadfael, that
these two young pilgrims should leave so soon, and so abruptly? Is it possible
the coming of Messire de Bretagne can have driven them away?” Cadfael considered, and shook his head.
“No, I think not. In the great press this morning, and the excitement, why
should one man among the many be noticed, and one not looked for at all in
these parts? But, yes, their going does greatly surprise me. For the one, he
should surely be only too glad of an extra day or two of rest before taking
barefoot to the roads again. And for the other, Father, there is a girl he
certainly admires and covets, whether he yet knows it to the full or no, and
with her he spent this morning, following Saint Winifred home, and I am certain
there was then no other thought in his mind but of her and her kin, and the
greatness of this day. For she is sister to the boy Rhun, who came by so great
a mercy and blessing before our eyes. It would take some very strong compulsion
to drag him away suddenly like this.” “The boy’s sister, you say?” Abbot
Radulfus recalled an intent which had been shelved in favour of Olivier’s
quest. There is still an hour or more before Vespers. I should like to talk
with this youth. You have been treating his condition, Cadfael. Do you think
your handling has had anything to do with what we witnessed today? Or could he,
though I would not willingly attribute falsity to one so young, could he have
made more of his distress than it was, in order to produce a prodigy?” “No,” said Cadfael very decidedly. “There
is no deceit at all in him. And as for my poor skills, they might in a long
time of perseverance have softened the tight cords that hampered the use of his
limb, and made it possible to set a little weight on it, but straighten that
foot and fill out the sinews of the leg, never! The greatest doctor in the
world could not have done it. Father, on the day he came I gave him a draught
that should have eased his pain and brought him sleep. After three nights he
sent it back to me untouched. He saw no reason why he should expect to be
singled out for healing, but he said that he offered his pain freely, who had
nothing else to give. Not to buy grace, but of his goodwill to give and want
nothing in return. And further, it seems that thus having accepted his pain out
of love, his pain left him. After Mass we saw that deliverance completed.” “Then it was well deserved,” said
Radulfus, pleased and moved. “I must indeed talk with this boy. Will you find
him for me, Cadfael, and bring him here to me now?” “Very gladly, Father,” said Cadfael, and
departed on his errand. Dame Alice was sitting in the sunshine of
the cloister garth, the centre of a voluble circle of other matrons, her face
so bright with the joy of the day that it warmed the very air; but Rhun was not
with them. Melangell had withdrawn into the shadow of the arcade, as though the
light was too bright for her eyes, and kept her face averted over the mending
of a frayed seam in a linen shirt which must belong to her brother. Even when
Cadfael addressed her she looked up only very swiftly and timidly, and again
stooped into shadow, but even in that glimpse he saw that the joy which had
made her shine like a new rose in the morning was dimmed and pale now in the
lengthening afternoon. And was he merely imagining that her left cheek showed
the faint bluish tint of a bruise? But at the mention of Rhun’s name she
smiled, as though at the recollection of happiness rather than its presence. “He said he was tired, and went away into
the dortoir to rest. Aunt Weaver thinks he is lying down on his bed, but I
think he wanted only to be left alone, to be quiet and not have to talk. He is
tired by having to answer things he seems not to understand himself.” “He speaks another tongue today from the
rest of mankind,” said Cadfael. “It may well be we who don’t understand, and
ask things that have no meaning for him.” He took her gently by the chin and
turned her face up to the light, but she twisted nervously out of his hold.
“You have hurt yourself?” Certainly it was a bruise beginning there. “It’s nothing,” she said. “My own fault. I
was in the garden, I ran too fast and I fell. I know it’s unsightly, but it
doesn’t hurt now.” Her eyes were very calm, not reddened,
only a little swollen as to the lids. Well, Matthew had gone, abandoned her to
go with his friend, letting her fall only too disastrously after the heady
running together of the morning hours. That could account for tears now past.
But should it account for a bruised cheek? He hesitated whether to question
further, but clearly she did not wish it. She had gone back doggedly to her
work, and would not look up again. Cadfael sighed, and went out across the
great court to the guest-hall. Even a glorious day like this one must have its
vein of bitter sadness. In the men’s dortoir Rhun sat alone on his
bed, very still and content in his blissfully restored body. He was deep in his
own rapt thoughts, but readily aware when Cadfael entered. He looked round and
smiled. “Brother, I was wishing to see you. You
were there, you know. Perhaps you even heard… See, how I’m changed!” The leg
once maimed stretched out perfect before him, he bent and stamped the boards of
the floor. He flexed ankle and toes, drew up his knee to his chin, and
everything moved as smoothly and painlessly as his ready tongue. “I am whole! I
never asked it, how dared I? Even then, I was praying not for this, and yet
this was given…” He went away again for a moment into his tranced dream. Cadfael sat down beside him, noting the
exquisite fluency of those joints hitherto flawed and intransigent. The boy’s
beauty was perfected now. “You were praying,” said Cadfael gently,
“for Melangell.” “Yes. And Matthew too. I truly thought…
But you see he is gone. They are both gone, gone together. Why could I not
bring my sister into bliss? I would have gone on crutches all my life for that,
but I couldn’t prevail.” “That is not yet determined,” said Cadfael
firmly. “Who goes may also return. And I think your prayers should have strong
virtue, if you do not fall into doubt now, because heaven has need of a little
time. Even miracles have their times. Half our lives in this world are spent in
waiting. It is needful to wait with faith.” Rhun sat listening with an absent smile,
and at the end of it he said: “Yes, surely, and I will wait. For see, one of
them left this behind in his haste when he went away.” He reached down between the close-set
cots, and lifted to the bed between them a bulky but lightweight scrip of
unbleached linen, with stout leather straps for the owner’s belt. “I found it
dropped between the two beds they had, drawn close together. I don’t know which
of them owned this one, the two they carried were much alike. But one of them
doesn’t expect or want ever to come back, does he? Perhaps Matthew does, and
has forgotten this, whether he meant it or no, as a pledge.” Cadfael stared and wondered, but this was
a heavy matter, and not for him. He said seriously: “I think you should bring
this with you, and give it into the keeping of Father Abbot. For he sent me to
bring you to him. He wants to speak with you.” “With me?” wavered Rhun, stricken into a
wild and rustic child again. “The lord abbot himself?” “Surely, and why not? You are Christian
soul as he is, and may speak with him as equal.” The boy faltered: “I should be afraid…” “No, you would not. You are not afraid of
anything, nor need you ever be.” Rhun sat for a moment with fists doubled
into the blanket of his bed; then he lifted his clear, ice-blue gaze and
blanched, angelic face and smiled blindingly into Cadfael’s eyes. “No, I need
not. I’ll come.” And he hoisted the linen scrip and stood up stately on his two
long, youthful legs, and led the way to the door. “Stay with us,” said Abbot Radulfus, when
Cadfael would have presented his charge and left the two of them together. “I
think he might be glad of you.” Also, said his eloquent, austere glance, your
presence may be of value to me as witness. “Rhun knows you. Me he does not yet
know, but I trust he shall, hereafter.” He had the drab, brownish scrip on the
desk before him, offered on entry with a word to account for it, until the time
came to explore its possibilities further. “Willingly, Father,” said Cadfael
heartily, and took his seat apart on a stool withdrawn into a corner, out of
the way of those two pairs of formidable eyes that met, and wondered, and
probed with equal intensity across the small space of the parlour. Outside the
windows the garden blossomed with drunken exuberance, in the burning colours of
summer, and the blanched blue sky, at its loftiest in the late afternoon,
showed the colour of Rhun’s eyes, but without their crystal blaze. The day of
wonders was drawing very slowly and radiantly towards its evening. “Son,” said Radulfus at his gentlest, “you
have been the vessel for a great mercy poured out here. I know, as all know who
were there, what we saw, what we felt. But I would know also what you passed
through. I know you have lived long with pain, and have not complained. I dare
guess in what mind you approached the saint’s altar. Tell me, what was it
happened to you then?” Rhun sat with his empty hands clasped
quietly in his lap, and his face at once remote and easy, looking beyond the
walls of the room. All his timidity was lost. “I was troubled,” he said carefully,
“because my sister and my Aunt Alice wanted so much for me, and I knew I needed
nothing. I would have come, and prayed, and passed, and been content. But then
I heard her call.” “Saint Winifred spoke to you?” asked
Radulfus softly. “She called me to her,” said Rhun
positively. “In what words?” “No words. What need had she of words? She
called me to go to her, and I went. She told me, here is a step, and here, and
here, come, you know you can. And I knew I could, so I went. When she told me,
kneel, for so you can, then I kneeled, and I could. Whatever she told me, that
I did. And so I will still,” said Rhun, smiling into the opposing wall with
eyes that paled the sun. “Child,” said the abbot, watching him in
solemn wonder and respect, “I do believe it. What skills you have, what gifts
to stead you in your future life, I scarcely know. I rejoice that you have to
the full the blessing of your body, and the purity of your mind and spirit. I
wish you whatever calling you may choose, and the virtue of your resolve to
guide you in it. If there is anything you can ask of this house, to aid you
after you go forth from here, it is yours.” “Father,” said Rhun earnestly, withdrawing
his blinding gaze into shadow and mortality, and becoming the child he was,
“need I go forth? She called me to her, how tenderly I have no words to tell. I
desire to remain with her to my life’s end. She called me to her, and I will
never willingly leave her.” Chapter Twelve “AND WILL YOU KEEP HIM?” asked Cadfael,
when the boy had been dismissed, made his deep reverence, and departed in his
rapt, unwitting perfection. “If his intent holds, yes, surely. He is
the living proof of grace. But I will not let him take vows in haste, to regret
them later. Now he is transported with joy and wonder, and would embrace
celibacy and seclusion with delight. If his will is still the same in a month,
then I will believe in it, and welcome him gladly. But he shall serve his full
notiviate, even so. I will not let him close the door upon himself until he is
sure. And now,” said the abbot, frowning down thoughtfully at the linen scrip
that lay upon his desk, “what is to be done with this? You say it was fallen
between the two beds, and might have belonged to either?” “So the boy said. But, Father, if you
remember, when the bishop’s ring was stolen, both those young men gave up their
scrips to be examined. What each of them carried, apart from the dagger that
was duly delivered over at the gatehouse, I cannot say with certainty, but
Father Prior, who handled them, will know.” “True, so he will. But for the present,”
said Radulfus, “I cannot think we have any right to probe into either man’s
possessions, nor is it of any great importance to discover to which of them
this belongs. If Messire de Bretagne overtakes them, as he surely must, we
shall learn more, he may even persuade them to return. We’ll wait for his word
first. In the meantime, leave it here with me.
When we know more we’ll take whatever steps we can to restore it.” The day of wonders drew in to its evening
as graciously as it had dawned, with a clear sky and soft, sweet air. Every
soul within the enclave came dutifully to Vespers, and supper in the guest-hall
as in the refectory was a devout and tranquil feast. The voices hasty and
shrill with excitement at dinner had softened and eased into the grateful
languor of fulfilment. Brother Cadfael absented himself from
Collations in the chapter house, and went out into the garden. On the gentle
ridge where the gradual slope of the pease fields began he stood for a long
while watching the sky. The declining sun had still an hour or more of its
course to run before its rim dipped into the feathery tops of the copses across
the brook. The west which had reflected the dawn as this day began triumphed
now in pale gold, with no wisp of cloud to dye it deeper or mark its purity.
The scent of the herbs within the walled garden rose in a heady cloud of
sweetness and spice. A good place, a resplendent day, why should any man slip
away and run from it? A useless question. Why should any man do
the things he does? Why should Ciaran submit himself to such hardship? Why
should he profess such piety and devotion, and yet depart without leave-taking
and without thanks in the middle of so auspicious a day? It was Matthew who had
left a gift of money on departure. Why could not Matthew persuade his friend to
stay and see out the day? And why should he, who had glowed with excited joy in
the morning, and run hand in hand with Melangell, abandon her without remorse
in the afternoon, and resume his harsh pilgrimage with Ciaran as if nothing had
happened? Were they two men or three? Ciaran,
Matthew and Luc Meverel? What did he know of them, all three, if three they
were? Luc Meverel had been seen for the last time south of Newbury, walking
north towards that town, and alone. Ciaran and Matthew were first reported, by
Brother Adam of Reading, coming from the south into Abingdon for their night’s
lodging, two together. If one of them was Luc Meverel, then where and why had
he picked up his companion, and above all, who was his companion? By this time, surely Olivier should have
overhauled his quarry and found the answers to some of these questions. And he
had said he would return, that he would not leave Shrewsbury without having
some converse with a man remembered as a good friend. Cadfael took that
assurance to his heart, and was warmed. It was not the need to tend any of his
herbal potions or bubbling wines that drew him to walk on to his workshop, for
Brother Oswin, now in the chapter house with his fellows, had tidied everything
for the night, and seen the brazier safely out. There was flint and tinder
there in a box, in case it should be necessary to light it again in the night
or early in the morning. It was rather that Cadfael had grown accustomed to
withdrawing to his own special solitude to do his best thinking, and this day
had given him more than enough cause for thought, as for gratitude. For where
were his qualms now? Miracles may be spent as frequently on the undeserving as
on the deserving. What marvel that a saint should take the boy Rhun to her
heart, and reach out her sustaining hand to him? But the second miracle was
doubly miraculous, far beyond her sorry servant’s asking, stunning in its
generosity. To bring him back Olivier, whom he had resigned to God and the great
world, and made himself content never to see again! And then Hugh’s voice,
unwitting herald of wonders, said out of the dim choir, “And are you demanding
yet a second miracle?” He had rather been humbling himself in wonder and thanks
for one, demanding nothing more; but he had turned his head, and beheld
Olivier. The western sky was still limpid and
bright, liquid gold, the sun still clear of the treetops, when he opened the
door of his workshop and stepped within, into the timber-warm, herb-scented
dimness. He thought and said afterwards that it was at that moment he saw the
inseparable relationship between Ciaran and Matthew suddenly overturned,
twisted into its opposite, and began, in some enclosed and detached part of his
intelligence, to make sense of the whole matter, however dubious and flawed the
revelation. But he had no time to catch and pin down the vision, for as his
foot crossed the threshold there was a soft gasp somewhere in the shadowy
corner of the hut, and a rustle of movement, as if some wild creature had been
disturbed in its lair, and shrunk into the last fastness to defend itself. He halted, and set the door wide open
behind him for reassurance that there was a possibility of escape. “Be easy!”
he said mildly. “May I not come into my own workshop without leave? And should
I be entering here to threaten any soul with harm?” His eyes, growing accustomed rapidly to
the dimness, which seemed dark only by contrast with the radiance outside,
scanned the shelves, the bubbling jars of wine in a fat row, the swinging,
rustling swathes of herbs dangling from the beams of the low roof. Everything
took shape and emerged into view. Stretched along the broad wooden bench
against the opposite wall, a huddle of tumbled skirts stirred slowly and reared
itself upright, to show him the spilled ripe-corn gold of a girl’s hair, and
the tear-stained, swollen-lidded countenance of Melangell. She said no word, but she did not drop
blindly into her sheltering arms again. She was long past that, and past being
afraid to show herself so to one secret, quiet creature whom she trusted. She
set down her feet in their scuffed leather shoes to the floor, and sat back
against the timbers of the wall, bracing slight shoulders to the solid contact.
She heaved one enormous, draining sigh that was dragged up from her very heels,
and left her weak and docile. When he crossed the beaten earth floor and sat
down beside her, she did not flinch away. “Now,” said Cadfael, settling himself with
deliberation, to give her time to compose at least her voice. The soft light
would spare her face. “Now, child dear, there is no one here who can either
save you or trouble you, and therefore you can speak freely, for everything you
say is between us two only. But we two together need to take careful counsel.
So what is it you know that I do not know?” “Why should we take counsel?” she said in
a small, drear voice from below his solid shoulder. “He is gone.” “What is gone may return. The roads lead
always two ways, hither as well as yonder. What are you doing out here alone,
when your brother walks erect on two sound feet, and has all he wants in this
world, but for your absence?” He did not look directly at her, but felt
the stir of warmth and softness through her body, which must have been a smile,
however flawed. “I came away,” she said, very low, “not to spoil his joy. I’ve
borne most of the day. I think no one has noticed half my heart was gone out of
me. Unless it was you,” she said, without blame, rather in resignation. “I saw you when we came from Saint Giles,”
said Cadfael, “you and Matthew. Your heart was whole then, so was his. If yours
is torn in two now, do you suppose his is preserved without wound? No! So what
passed, afterwards? What was this sword that shore through your heart and his?
You know! You may tell it now. They are gone, there is nothing left to spoil.
There may yet be something to save.” She turned her forehead into his shoulder
and wept in silence for a little while. The light within the hut grew rather
than dimming, now that his eyes were accustomed. She forgot to hide her forlorn
and bloated face, he saw the bruise on her cheek darkening into purple. He laid
an arm about her and drew her close for the comfort of the flesh. That of the
spirit would need more of time and thought. “He struck you?” “I held him,” she said, quick in his
defence. “He could not get free.” “And he was so frantic? He must go?” “Yes, whatever it cost him or me. Oh,
Brother Cadfael, why? I thought, I believed he loved me, as I do him. But see
how he used me in his anger!” “Anger?” said Cadfael sharply, and turned
her by the shoulders to study her more intently. “Whatever the compulsion on
him to go with his friend, why should he be angry with you? The loss was yours,
but surely no blame.” “He blamed me for not telling him,” she
said drearily. “But I did only what Ciaran asked of me. For his sake and yours,
he said, yes, and for mine, too, let me go, but hold him fast. Don’t tell him I
have the ring again, he said, and I will go. Forget me, he said, and help him
to forget me. He wanted us to remain together and be happy…” “Are you telling me,” demanded Cadfael
sharply, “that they did not go together! That Ciaran made off without him?” “It was not like that,” sighed Melangell.
“He meant well by us, that’s why he stole away alone…” “When was this? When? When did you have
speech with him? When did he go?” “I was here at dawn, you’ll remember. I
met Ciaran by the brook…” She drew a deep, desolate breath and loosed the whole
flood of it, every word she could recall of that meeting in the early morning,
while Cadfael gazed appalled, and the vague glimpse he had had of enlightenment
awoke and stirred again in his mind, far clearer now. “Go on! Tell me what followed between you
and Matthew. You did as you were bidden, I know, you drew him with you, I doubt
he ever gave a thought to Ciaran all those morning hours, believing him still
penned withindoors, afraid to stir. When was it he found out?” “After dinner it came into his mind that
he had not seen him. He was very uneasy. He went to look for him everywhere… He
came to me here in the garden. “God keep you, Melangell,” he said, “you must
fend for yourself now, sorry as I am…” Almost every word of that encounter she
had by heart, she repeated them like a tired child repeating a lesson. “I said
too much, he knew I had spoken with Ciaran, he knew that I knew he’d meant to
go secretly…” “And then, after you had owned as much?” “He laughed,” she said, and her very voice
froze into a despairing whisper. “I never heard him laugh until this morning,
and then it was such a sweet sound. But this laughter was not so! Bitter and
raging.” She stumbled through the rest of it, every word another fine line
added to the reversed image that grew in Cadfael’s mind, mocking his memory. “He
sets me free!” And “You must be his confederate!” The words were so burned on
her mind that she even reproduced the savagery of their utterance. And how few
words it took, in the end, to transform everything, to turn devoted attendance
into remorseless pursuit, selfless love into dedicated hatred, noble
self-sacrifice into calculated flight, and the voluntary mortification of the
flesh into body armour which must never be doffed. He heard again, abruptly and piercingly,
Ciaran’s wild cry of alarm as he clutched his cross to him, and Matthew’s voice
saying softly: “Yet he should doff it. How else can he truly be rid of his
pains?” How else, indeed! Cadfael recalled, too,
how he had reminded them both that they were here to attend the feast of a
saint who might have life itself within her gift, “even for a man already
condemned to death!” Oh, Saint Winifred, stand by me now, stand by us all, with
a third miracle to better the other two! He took Melangell brusquely by the chin,
and lifted her face to him. “Girl, look to yourself now for a while, for I must
leave you. Do up your hair and keep a brave face, and go back to your kin as
soon as you can bear their eyes on you. Go into the church for a time, it will
be quiet there now, and who will wonder if you give a longer time to your
prayers? They will not even wonder at past tears, if you can smile now. Do as
well as you can, for I have a thing I must do.” There was nothing he could promise her, no
sure hope he could leave with her. He turned from her without another word,
leaving her staring after him between dread and reassurance, and went striding
in haste through the gardens and out across the court, to the abbot’s lodging. If Radulfus was surprised to have Cadfael
ask audience again so soon, he gave no sign of it, but had him admitted at
once, and put aside his book to give his full attention to whatever this fresh
business might be. Plainly it was something very much to the current purpose
and urgent. “Father,” said Cadfael, making short work
of explanations, “there’s a new twist here. Messire de Bretagne has gone off on
a false trail. Those two young men did not leave by the Oswestry road, but
crossed the Meole brook and set off due west to reach Wales the nearest way.
Nor did they leave together. Ciaran slipped away during the morning, while his
fellow was with us in the procession, and Matthew has followed him by the same
way as soon as he learned of his going. And, Father, there’s good cause to
think that the sooner they’re overtaken and halted, the better surely for one,
and I believe for both. I beg you, let me take a horse and follow. And send
word of this to Hugh Beringar in the town, to come after us on the same trail.” Radulfus received all this with a grave
but calm face, and asked no less shortly: “How did you come by this word?” “From the girl who spoke with Ciaran
before he departed. No need to doubt it is all true. And, Father, one more
thing before you bid me go. Open, I beg you, that scrip they left behind, let
me see if it has anything more to tell us of this pair, at the least, of one of
them.” Without a word or an instant of
hesitation, Radulfus dragged the linen scrip into the light of his candles, and
unbuckled the fastening. The contents he drew out fully upon the desk, sparse
enough, what the poor pilgrim would carry, having few possessions and desiring
to travel light. “You know, I think,” said the abbot,
looking up sharply, “to which of the two this belonged?” “I do not know, but I guess. In my mind I
am sure, but I am also fallible. Give me leave!” With a sweep of his hand he spread the
meagre belongings over the desk. The purse, thin enough when Prior Robert had
handled it before, lay flat and empty now. The leather-bound breviary,
well-used, worn but treasured, had been rolled into the folds of the shirt, and
when Cadfael reached for it the shirt slid from the desk and fell to the floor.
He let it lie as he opened the book. Within the cover was written, in a clerk’s
careful hand, the name of its owner: Juliana Bossard. And below, in newer ink
and a less practised hand: Given to me, Luc Meverel, this Christmastide, 1140.
God be with us all! “So I pray, too,” said Cadfael, and
stooped to pick up the fallen shirt. He held it up to the light, and his eye
caught the thread-like outline of a stain that rimmed the left shoulder. His
eye followed the line over the shoulder, and found it continued down and round
the left side of the breast. The linen, otherwise, was clean enough, bleached
by several launderings from its original brownish natural colouring. He spread
it open, breast up, on the desk. The thin brown line, sharp on its outer edge,
slightly blurred within, hemmed a great space spanning the whole left part of
the chest and the upper part of the left sleeve. The space within the outline had
been washed clear of any stain, even the rim was pale, but it stood clear to be
seen, and the scattered shadowings of colour within it preserved a faint hint
of what had been there. Radulfus, if he had not ventured as far
afield in the world as Cadfael, had nevertheless stored up some experience of
it. He viewed the extended evidence and said composedly, “This was blood.” “So it was,” said Cadfael, and rolled up
the shirt. “And whoever owned this scrip came from
where a certain Juliana Bossard was chatelaine.” His deep eyes were steady and
sombre on Cadfael’s face. “Have we entertained a murderer in our house?” “I think we have,” said Cadfael, restoring
the scattered fragments of a life to their modest lodging. A man’s life, shorn
of all expectation of continuance, even the last coin gone from the purse. “But
I think we may have time yet to prevent another killing, if you give me leave
to go.” “Take the best of what may be in the
stable,” said the abbot simply, “and I will send word to Hugh Beringar, and have
him follow you, and not alone.” Chapter Thirteen SEVERAL MILES NORTH on the Oswestry road,
Olivier drew rein by the roadside where a wiry, bright-eyed boy was grazing
goats on the broad verge, lush in summer growth and coming into seed. The child
twitched one of his long leads on his charges, to bring him along gently where
the early evening light lay warm on the tall grass. He looked up at the rider
without awe, half-Welsh and immune from servility. He smiled and gave an easy
good evening. The boy was handsome, bold, unafraid; so
was the man. They looked at each other and liked what they saw. “God be with you!” said Olivier. “How long
have you been pasturing your beasts along here? And have you in all that time
seen a lame man and a well man go by, the pair of them much of my age, but
afoot?” “God be with you, master,” said the boy
cheerfully. “Here along this verge ever since noon, for I brought my bit of
dinner with me. But I’ve seen none such pass. And I’ve had a word by the road
with every soul that did go by, unless he were galloping.” “Then I waste my hurrying,” said Olivier,
and idled a while, his horse stooping to the tips of the grasses. “They cannot
be ahead of me, not by this road. See, now, supposing they wished to go earlier
into Wales, how may I bear round to pick them up on the way? They went from
Shrewsbury town ahead of me, and I have word to bring to them. Where can I turn
west and fetch a circle about the town?” The young herdsman accepted with open arms
every exchange that refreshed his day’s labour. He gave his mind to the best
road offering, and delivered judgement: “Turn back but a mile or more, back
across the bridge at Montford, and then you’ll find a well-used cart-track that
bears off west, to your right hand it will be. Bear a piece west again where
the paths first branch, it’s no direct way, but it does go on. It skirts
Shrewsbury a matter of above four miles outside the town, and threads the edges
of the forest, but it cuts across every path out of Shrewsbury. You may catch your
men yet. And I wish you may!” “My thanks for that,” said Olivier “and
for your advice also.” He stooped to the hand the boy had raised, not for alms
but to caress the horse’s chestnut shoulder with admiration and pleasure, and
slipped a coin into the smooth palm. “God be with you!” he said, and wheeled
his mount and set off back along the road he had travelled. “And go with you, master!” the boy called
after him, and watched until a curve of the road took horse and rider out of
sight beyond a stand of trees. The goats gathered closer; evening was near, and
they were ready to turn homeward, knowing the hour by the sun as well as did
their herder. The boy drew in their tethers, whistled to them cheerily, and
moved on along the road to his homeward path through the fields. Olivier came for the second time to the
bridge over the Severn, one bank a steep, tree-clad escarpment, the other open,
level meadow. Beyond the first plane of fields a winding track turned off to
the right, between scattered stands of trees, bearing at this point rather
south than west, but after a mile or more it brought him on to a better road
that crossed his track left and right. He bore right into the sun, as he had
been instructed, and at the next place where two dwindling paths divided he
turned left, and keeping his course by the sinking sun on his right hand, now
just resting upon the rim of the world and glimmering through the trees in
sudden blinding glimpses, began to work his way gradually round the town of
Shrewsbury. The tracks wound in and out of copses, the fringe woods of the
northern tip of the Long Forest, sometimes in twilight among dense trees,
sometimes in open heath and scrub, sometimes past islets of cultivated fields
and glimpses of hamlets. He rode with ears pricked for any promising sound,
pausing wherever his labyrinthine path crossed a track bearing westward out of
Shrewsbury, and wherever he met with cottage or assart he asked after his two
travellers. No one had seen such a pair pass by. Olivier took heart. They had
had some hours start of him, but if they had not passed westward by any of the
roads he had yet crossed, they might still be within the circle he was drawing
about the town. The barefoot one would not find these ways easy going, and
might have been forced to take frequent rests. At the worst, even if he missed
them in the end, this meandering route must bring him round at last to the
highroad by which he had first approached Shrewsbury from the south-east, and
he could ride back into the town to Hugh Beringar’s welcome, none the worse for
a little exercise in a fine evening. Brother Cadfael had wasted no time in
clambering into his boots, kilting his habit, and taking and saddling the best
horse he could find in the stables. It was not often he had the chance to
indulge himself with such half-forgotten delights, but he was not thinking of
that now. He had left considered word with the messenger who was already
hurrying across the bridge and into the town, to alert Hugh; and Hugh would ask
no questions, as the abbot had asked none, recognising the grim urgency there
was no leisure now to explain. “Say to Hugh Beringar,” the order ran,
“that Ciaran will make for the Welsh border the nearest way, but avoiding the
too open roads. I think he’ll bear south a small way to the old road the Romans
made, that we’ve been fools enough to let run wild, for it keeps a steady level
and makes straight for the border north of Caus.” That was drawing a bow at a venture, and
he knew it, none better. Ciaran was not of these parts, though he might well
have some knowledge of the borderland if he had kin on the Welsh side. But more
than that, he had been here these three days past, and if he had been planning
some such escape all that time, he could have picked the brains of brothers and
guests, on easily plausible ground. Time pressed, and sound guessing was
needed. Cadfael chose his way, and set about pursuing it. He did not waste time in going decorously
out at the gatehouse and round by the road to take up the chase westward, but
led his horse at a trot through the gardens, to the blank astonishment of
Brother Jerome, who happened to be crossing to the cloisters a good ten minutes
early for Compline. No doubt he would report, with a sense of outrage, to Prior
Robert. Cadfael as promptly forgot him, leading the horse round the unharvested
pease field and down to the quiet green stretches of the brook, and across to
the narrow meadow, where he mounted. The sun was dipping its rim beyond the
crowns of the trees to westward. Into that half-shine, half-shadow Cadfael
spurred, and made good speed while the tracks were familiar to him as his own
palm. Due west until he hit the road, a half-mile on the road at a canter,
until it turned too far to the south, and then westward again for the setting
sun. Ciaran had a long start, even of Matthew, let alone of all those who
followed now. But Ciaran was lame, burdened and afraid. Almost he was to be
pitied. Half a mile further on, at an
inconspicuous track which he knew, Cadfael again turned to bear south-west, and
burrowed into deepest shade, and into the northernmost woodlands of the Long
Forest. No more than a narrow forest ride, this, between sweeping branches, a
fragment of ancient wood not worth clearing for an assart, being bedded on rock
that broke surface here and there. This was not yet border country, but close
kin to it, heaving into fretful outcrops that broke the thin soil, bearing
heather and coarse upland grasses, scrub bushes and sparsity trees, then
bringing forth prodigal life roofed by very old trees in every wet hollow. A
little further on this course, and the close, dark woods began, tall top cover,
heavy interweaving of middle growth, and a tangle of bush and bramble and
ground-cover below. Undisturbed forest, though there were rare islands of
tillage bright and open within it, every one an astonishment. Then he came to the old, old road, that
sliced like a knife across his path, heading due east, due west. He wondered
about the men who had made it. It was shrunken now from a soldiers’ road to a
narrow ride, mostly under thin turf, but it ran as it had always run since it
was made, true and straight as a lance, perfectly levelled where a level was
possible, relentlessly climbing and descending where some hummock barred the way.
Cadfael turned west into it, and rode straight for the golden upper arc of sun
that still glowed between the branches. In the parcel of old forest north and west
of the hamlet of Hanwood there were groves where stray outlaws could find ample
cover, provided they stayed clear of the few settlements within reach. Local
people tended to fence their holdings and band together to protect their own
small ground. The forest was for plundering, poaching, pasturing of swine, all
with secure precautions. Travellers, though they might call on hospitality and
aid where needed, must fend for themselves in the thicker coverts, if they
cared to venture through them. By and large, safety here in Shropshire under
Hugh Beringar was as good as anywhere in England, and encroachment by vagabonds
could not survive long, but for brief occupation the cover was there, and
unwanted tenants might take up occupation if pressed. Several of the lesser manors in these
border regions had declined by reason of their perilous location, and some were
half-deserted, leaving their fields untilled. Until April of this year the
border castle of Caus had been in Welsh hands, an added threat to peaceful
occupation, and there had not yet been time since Hugh’s reclamation of the
castle for the depleted hamlets to re-establish themselves. Moreover, in this
high summer it was no hardship to live wild, and skilful poaching and a little
profitable thievery could keep two or three good fellows in meat while they
allowed time for their exploits in the south to be forgotten, and made up their
minds where best to pass the time until a return home seemed possible. Master Simeon Poer, self-styled merchant
of Guildford, was not at all ill-content with the pickings made in Shrewsbury.
In three nights, which was the longest they dared reckon on operating
unsuspected, they had taken a fair amount of money from the hopeful gamblers of
the town and Foregate, besides the price Daniel Aurifaber had paid for the
stolen ring, the various odds and ends William Hales had abstracted from market
stalls, and the coins John Shure had used his long, smooth, waxed finger-nails
to extract from pocket and purse in the crowds. It was a pity they had had to
leave William Hales to his fate during the raid, but all in all they had done
well to get out of it with no more than a bruise or two, and one man short. Bad
luck for William, but it was the way the lot had fallen. Every man knew it
could happen to him. They had avoided the used tracks,
refraining from meddling with any of the local people going about their
business, and done their plundering by night and stealthily, after first making
sure where there were dogs to be reckoned with. They even had a roof of sorts,
for in the deepest thickets below the old road, overgrown and well-concealed,
they had found the remains of a hut, relic of a failed assart abandoned long
ago. After a few days more of this easy living, or if the weather should
change, they would set off to make their way somewhat south, to be well clear
of Shrewsbury before moving across to the east, to shires where they were not
yet known. When the rare traveller came past on the
road, it was almost always a local man, and they let him alone, for he would be
missed all too soon, and the hunt would be up in a day. But they would not have
been averse to waylaying any solitary who was clearly a stranger and on his way
to more distant places, since he was unlikely to be missed at once, and
further, he was likely to be better worth robbing, having on him the means to
finance his journey, however modestly. In these woods and thickets, a man could
vanish very neatly, and for ever. They had made themselves comfortable that
night outside their hut, with the embers of their fire safe in the clay-lined
hollow they had made for it, and the grease of the stolen chicken still on
their fingers. The sunset of the outer world was already twilight here, but
they had their night eyes, and were wide awake and full of restless energy
after an idle day. Walter Bagot was charged with keeping such watch as they
thought needful, and had made his way in cover some distance along the narrow
track towards the town. He came sliding back in haste, but shining with
anticipation instead of alarm. “Here’s one coming we may safely pick off.
The barefoot fellow from the abbey… well back as yet, and lame as ever, he’s
been among the stones, surely. Not a soul will know where he went to.” “He?” said Simeon Poer, surprised. “Fool,
he has always his shadow breathing down his neck. It would mean both, if one
got away he’d raise the hunt on us.” “He has not his shadow now,” said Bagot
gleefully. “Alone, I tell you, he’s shaken him off, or else they’ve parted by
consent. Who else cares a groat what becomes of him?” “And a groat’s his worth,” said Shure
scornfully. “Let him go. It’s never worth it for his hose and shirt, and what
else can he have on him?” “Ah, but he has! Money, my friend!” said
Bagot, glittering. “Make no mistake, that one goes very well provided, if he
takes good care not to let it be known. I know! I’ve felt my way about him
every time I could get crowded against him in church, he has a solid, heavy
purse belted about him inside coat, hose, shirt and all, but I never could get
my fingers into it without using the knife, and that was too risky. He can pay
his way wherever he goes. Come, rouse, he’ll be an easy mark now.” He was certain, and they were heartily
willing to pick up an extra purse. They rose merrily, hands on daggers, worming
their way quietly through the underbrush towards the thin thread of the track,
above which the ribbon of clear sky showed pale and bright still. Shure and
Bagot lurking invisible on the near side of the path, Simeon Poer across it,
behind the lush screen of bushes that took advantage of the open light to grow
leafy and tall. There were very old trees in their tract of forest, enormous
beeches with trunks so gnarled and thick three men with arms outspread could
hardly clip them. Old woodland was being cleared, assarted and turned into
hunting-grounds in many places, but the Long Forest still preserved large
tracts of virgin growth untouched. In the green dimness the three masterless
men stood still as the trees, and waited. Then they heard him. Dogged, steady,
laborious steps that stirred the coarse grasses. In the turfed verge of a
highroad he could have gone with less pain and covered twice the miles he had
accomplished on these rough ways. They heard his heavy breathing while he was
still twenty yards away from them, and saw his tall, dark figure stir the
dimness, leaning forward on a long, knotty staff he had picked up somewhere
from among the debris of the trees. It seemed that he favoured the right foot,
though both trod with wincing tenderness, as though he had trodden askew on a
sharp-edged stone, and either cut his sole or twisted his ankle-joint. He was
piteous, if there had been anyone to pity him. He went with ears pricked, and the very
hairs of his skin erected, in as intense wariness as any of the small nocturnal
creatures that crept and quaked in the underbrush around him. He had walked in
fear every step of the miles he had gone in company, but now, cast loose to his
own dreadful company, he was even more afraid. Escape was no escape at all. It was the extremity of his fear that
saved him. They had let him pass slowly by the first covert, so that Bagot
might be behind him, and Poer and Shure one on either side before him. It was
not so much his straining ears as the prickly sensitivity of his skin that
sensed the sudden rushing presence at his back, the shifting of the cool
evening air, and the weight of body and arm launched at him almost silently. He
gave a muted shriek and whirled about, sweeping the staff around him, and the
knife that should have impaled him struck the branch and sliced a ribbon of
bark and wood from it. Bagot reached with his left hand for a grip on sleeve or
coat, and struck again as nimbly as a snake, but missed his hold as Ciaran
leaped wildly back out of reach, and driven beyond himself by terror, turned
and plunged away on his lacerated feet, aside from the path and into the
deepest and thickest shadows among the tangled trees. He hissed and moaned with
pain as he went, but he ran like a startled hare. Who would have thought he could still move
so fast, once pushed to extremes? But he could not keep it up long, the spur
would not carry him far. The three of them went after, spreading out a little
to hem him from three sides when he fell exhausted. They were giggling as they
went, and in no special haste. The mingled sounds of his crashing passage
through the bushes and his uncontrollable whining with the pain of it, rang
unbelievably strangely in the twilit woods. Branches and brambles lashed Ciaran’s
face. He ran blindly, sweeping the long staff before him, cutting a noisy
swathe through the bushes and stumbling painfully in the thick ground-debris of
dead branches and soft, treacherous pits of the leaves of many years. They
followed at leisure, aware that he was slowing. The lean, agile tailor had
drawn level with him, somewhat aside, and was bearing round to cut him off,
still with breath enough to whistle to his fellows as they closed unhurriedly,
like dogs herding a stray sheep. Ciaran fell out into a more open glade, where
a huge old beech had preserved its own clearing, and with what was left of his
failing breath he made a last dash to cross the open and vanish again into the
thickets beyond. The dry silt of leaves among the roots betrayed him. His
footing slid from under him, and fetched him down heavily against the bole of
the tree. He had just time to drag himself up and set his back to the broad
trunk before they were on him. He flailed about him with the staff,
screaming for aid, and never even knew on what name he was calling in his
extremity. “Help! Murder! Matthew, Matthew, help me!” There was no answering shout, but there
was an abrupt thrashing of branches, and something hurtled out of cover and
across the grass, so suddenly that Bagot was shouldered aside and stumbled to
his knees. A long arm swept Ciaran back hard against the solid bole of the
tree, and Matthew stood braced beside him, his dagger naked in his hand. What
remained of the western light showed his face roused and formidable, and
gleamed along the blade. “Oh, no!” he challenged loud and clear,
lips drawn back from bared teeth. “Keep your hands off! This man is mine!” Chapter Fourteen THE THREE ATTACKERS had drawn off
instinctively, before they realised that this was but one man erupting in their
midst, but they were quick to grasp it, and had not gone far. They stood, wary
as beasts of prey but undeterred, weaving a little in a slow circle out of
reach, but with no thought of withdrawing. They watched and considered,
weighing up coldly these altered odds. Two men and a knife to reckon with now,
and this second one they knew as well as the first. They had been some days
frequenting the same enclave, using the same dortoir and refectory. They
reasoned without dismay that they must be known as well as they knew their
prey. The twilight made faces shadowy, but a man is recognised by more things
than his face. “I said it, did I not?” said Simeon Poer,
exchanging glances with his henchmen, glances which were understood even in the
dim light. “I said he would not be far. No matter, two can lie as snug as one.” Once having declared his claim and his
rights, Matthew said nothing. The tree against which they braced themselves was
so grown that they could not be attacked from close behind. He circled it
steadily when Bagot edged round to the far side, keeping his face to the enemy.
There were three to watch, and Ciaran was shaken and lame, and in no case to
match any of the three if it came to action, though he kept his side of the
trunk with his staff gripped and ready, and would fight if he must, tooth and
claw, for his forfeit life. Matthew curled his lips in a bitter smile at the
thought that he might be grateful yet for that strong appetite for living. Round the bole of the tree, with his cheek
against the bark, Ciaran said, low-voiced: “You’d have done better not to
follow me.” “Did I not swear to go with you to the
very end?” said Matthew as softly. “I keep my vows. This one above all.” “Yet you could still have crept away
safely. Now we are two dead men.” “Not yet! If you did not want me, why did
you call me?” There was a bewildered silence. Ciaran did
not know he had uttered a name. “We are grown used to each other,” said
Matthew grimly. “You claimed me, as I claim you. Do you think I’ll let any
other man have you?” The three watchers had gathered in a
shadowy group, conferring with heads together, and faces still turned towards
their prey. “Now they’ll come,” said Ciaran in the
dead voice of despair. “No, they’ll wait for darkness.” They were in no hurry. They made no loose,
threatening moves, wasted no breath on words. They bided their time as
patiently as hunting animals. Silently they separated, spacing themselves round
the clearing, and backing just far enough into cover to be barely visible, yet
visible all the same, for their presence and stillness were meant to unnerve.
Just so, motionless, relentless and alert, would a cat sit for hours outside a
mousehole. “This I cannot bear,” said Ciaran in a
faint whisper, and drew sobbing breath. “It is easily cured,” said Matthew through
his teeth. “You have only to lift off that cross from your neck, and you can be
loosed from all your troubles.” The light faded still. Their eyes, raking
the smoky darkness of the bushes, were beginning to see movement where there
was none, and strain in vain after it where it lurked and shifted to baffle
them more. This waiting would not be long. The attackers circled in cover,
watching for the unguarded moment when one or other of their victims would be
caught unawares, staring in the wrong direction. Past all question they would
expect that failure first from Ciaran, half-foundering as he already was. Soon
now, very soon. Brother Cadfael was some half-mile back
along the ride when he heard the cry, ahead and to the right of the path, loud,
wild and desperate. The words were indistinguishable, but the panic in the
sound there was no mistaking. In this woodland silence, without even a wind to
stir the branches or flutter the leaves, every sound carried clearly. Cadfael
spurred ahead in haste, with all too dire a conviction of what he might find when
he reached the source of that lamentable cry. All those miles of pursuit,
patient and remorseless, half the length of England, might well be ending now,
barely a quarter of an hour too soon for him to do anything to prevent. Matthew
had overtaken, surely, a Ciaran grown weary of his penitential austerities, now
there was no one by to see. He had said truly enough that he did not hate
himself so much as to bear his hardships to no purpose. Now that he was alone,
had he felt safe in discarding his heavy cross, and would he next have been in
search of shoes for his feet? If Matthew had not come upon him thus recreant
and disarmed. The second sound to break the stillness
almost passed unnoticed because of the sound of his own progress, but he caught
some quiver of the forest’s unease, and reined in to listen intently. The rush
and crash of something or someone hurtling through thick bushes, fast and
arrow-straight, and then, very briefly, a confusion of cries, not loud but
sharp and wary, and a man’s voice loud and commanding over all. Matthew’s
voice, not in triumph or terror, rather in short and resolute defiance. There
were more than the two of them, there ahead, and not so far ahead now. He dismounted, and led his horse at an
anxious trot as far as he dared along the path; towards the spot from which the
sounds had come. Hugh could move very fast when he saw reason, and in Cadfael’s
bare message he would have found reason enough. He would have left the town by
the most direct way, over the western bridge and so by a good road south-west,
to strike this old path barely two miles back. At this moment he might be
little more than a mile behind. Cadfael tethered his horse at the side of the
track, for a plain sign that he had found cause to halt here and was somewhere
close by. All was quiet about him now. He quested
along the fringe of bushes for a place where he might penetrate without any
betraying noise, and began to work his way by instinct and touch towards the
place whence the cries had come, and where now all was almost unnaturally
silent. In a little while he was aware of the last faint pallor of the
afterglow glimmering between the branches. There was a more open glade ahead of
him. He froze and stood motionless, as a shadow
passed silently between him and this lingering glimpse of light. Someone tall
and lean, slithering snake-like through the bushes. Cadfael waited until the
faint pattern of light was restored, and then edged carefully forward until he
could see into the clearing. The great bole of a beech-tree showed in
the centre, a solid mass beneath its spread of branches. There was movement
there in the dimness. Not one man, but two, stood pressed against the bole. A
brief flash of steel caught just light enough to show what it was, a dagger
naked and ready. Two at bay here, and surely more than one pinning them thus
helpless until they could be safely pulled down. Cadfael stood still to survey
the whole of the darkening clearing, and found, as he had expected, another
quiver of leaves that hid a man, and then, on the opposite side, yet another.
Three, probably all armed, certainly up to no good, thus furtively prowling the
woods by night, going nowhere, waiting to make the kill. Three had vanished
from the dice school under the bridge at Shrewsbury, and fled in this
direction. Three reappeared here in the forest, still doing after their
disreputable kind. Cadfael stood hesitant, pondering how best
to deal, whether to steal back to the path and wait and hope for Hugh’s coming,
or attempt something alone, at least to distract and dismay, to bring about a
delay that might afford time for help to come. He had made up his mind to
return to his horse, mount, and ride in here with as much noise and turmoil as
he could muster, trying to sound like six mounted men instead of one, when with
shattering suddenness the decision was taken out of his hands. One of the three besiegers sprang out of
cover with a startling shout, and rushed at the tree on the side where the
momentary flash of steel had shown one of the victims, at least, to be armed. A
dark figure leaned out from the darkness under the branches to meet the
onslaught, and Cadfael knew him then for Matthew. The attacker swerved aside,
still out of reach, in a calculated feint, and at the same moment both the other
lurking shadows burst out of cover and bore down upon the other side of the
tree, falling as one upon the weaker opponent. There was a confusion of
violence, and a wild, tormented scream, and Matthew whirled about, slashing
round him and stretching a long arm across his companion, pinning him back
against the tree. Ciaran hung half-fainting, slipping down between the great,
smooth bastions of the bole, and Matthew bestrode him, his dagger sweeping
great swathes before them both. Cadfael saw it, and was held mute and
motionless, beholding this devoted enemy. He got his breath only as all three
of the predators closed upon their prey together, slashing, mauling, by sheer
weight bearing them down under them. Cadfael filled his lungs full, and
bellowed to the shaken night: “Hold, there! On them, hold them all three. These
are our felons!” He was making so much noise that he did not notice or marvel
that the echoes, which in his fury he heard but did not heed, came from two
directions at once, from the path he had left, and from the opposite point,
from the north. Some corner of his mind knew he had roused echoes, but for his
part he felt himself quite alone as he kept up his roaring, spread his sleeves
like the wings of a bat, and surged headlong into the melee about the tree. Long, long ago he had forsworn arms, but
what of it? Barring his two stout fists, still active but somewhat rheumatic
now, he was unarmed. He flung himself into the tangle of men and weapons under
the beech, laid hands on the back of a dangling capuchon, hauled its wearer
bodily backwards, and twisted the cloth to choke the throat that howled rage
and venom at him. But his voice had done more than his martial progress. The
black huddle of humanity burst into its separate beings. Two sprang clear and
looked wildly about them for the source of the alarm, and Cadfael’s opponent
reached round, gasping, with a long arm and a vicious dagger, and sliced a
dangling streamer out of a rusty black sleeve. Cadfael lay on him with all his
weight, held him by the hair, and ground his face into the earth, shamelessly
exulting. He would do penance for it some day soon, but now he rejoiced, all
his crusader blood singing in his veins. Distantly he was aware that something else
was happening, more than he had reckoned on. He heard and felt the unmistakable
quiver and thud of the earth reacting to hooves, and heard a peremptory voice
shouting orders, the purport of which he did not release his grip to decypher
or attend to. The glade was filled with motion as it filled with darkness. The
creature under him gathered itself and heaved mightily, rolling him aside. His
hold on the folds of the hood relaxed, and Simeon Poer tore himself free and
scrambled clear. There was running every way, but none of the fugitives got
far. Last of the three to roll breathless out
of hold, Simeon groped about him vengefully in the roots of the tree, touched a
cowering body, found the cord of some dangling relic, possibly precious, in his
hand, and hauled with all his strength before he gathered himself up and ran
for cover. There was a wild scream of pain, and the
cord broke, and the thing, whatever it was, came loose in his hand. He got his
feet under him, and charged head-down for the nearest bushes, hurtled into them
and ran, barely a yard clear of hands that stooped from horseback to claw at
him. Cadfael opened his eyes and hauled in
breath. The whole clearing was boiling with movement, the darkness heaved and
trembled, and the violence had ordered itself into purpose and meaning. He sat
up, and took his time to look about him. He was sprawled under the great beech,
and somewhere before him, towards the path where he had left his horse, someone
with flint and dagger and tinder, was striking sparks for a torch, very calmly.
The sparks caught, glowed, and were gently blown into flame. The torch, well
primed with oil and resin, sucked in the flame and gave birth to a small,
shapely flame of its own, that grew and reared, and was used to kindle a second
and a third. The clearing took on a small, confined, rounded shape, walled with
close growth, roofed with the tree. Hugh came out of the dark, smiling, and
reached a hand to haul him to his feet. Someone else came running light-footed
from the other side, and stooped to him a wonderful, torch-lit face,
high-boned, lean-cheeked, with eager golden eyes, and blue-black raven wings of
hair curving to cup his cheeks. “Olivier?” said Cadfael, marvelling. “I
thought you were astray on the road to Oswestry. How did you ever find us
here?” “By grace of God and a goat-herd,” said
the warm, gay, remembered voice, “and your bull’s bellowing. Come, look round!
You have won your field. They were gone, Simeon Poer, merchant of Guildford,
Walter Bagot, glover, John Shure, tailor, all fled, but with half a dozen of
Hugh’s men hard on their heels, all to be brought in captive, to answer for
more, this time, than a little cheating in the marketplace. Night stooped to
enfold a closed arena of torchlight, very quiet now and almost still. Cadfael
rose, his torn sleeve dangling awkwardly. The three of them stood in a half-circle
about the beech-tree. The torchlight was stark, plucking light
and shadow into sharp relief. Matthew stirred out of his colloquy between life
and death very slowly as they watched him, heaved his wide shoulders clear of
the tree, and stood forth like a sleeper roused before his time, looking about
him as if for something by which he might hold, and take his bearings. Between
his feet, as he emerged, the coiled, crumpled form of Ciaran came into view,
faintly stirring, his head huddled into his close-folded arms. “Get up!” said Matthew. He drew back a
little from the tree, his naked dagger in his hand, a slow drop gathering at
its tip, more drops falling steadily from the hand that held it. His knuckles
were sliced raw. “Get up!” he said. “You are not harmed.” Ciaran gathered himself very slowly, and
clambered to his knees, lifting to the light a face soiled and leaden, gone
beyond exhaustion, beyond fear. He looked neither at Cadfael nor at Hugh, but
stared up into Matthew’s face with the helpless intensity of despair. Hugh felt
the clash of eyes, and stirred to make some decisive movement and break the
tension, but Cadfael laid a hand on his arm and held him still. Hugh gave him a
sharp sidelong glance, and accepted the caution. Cadfael had his reasons. There was blood on the torn collar of
Ciaran’s shirt, a stain that grew sluggishly before their eyes. He put up hands
that seemed heavy as lead, and fumbled aside the linen from throat and breast.
All round the left side of his neck ran a raw, bleeding slash, thin as a
knife-cut. Simeon Poer’s last blind clutch for plunder had torn loose the cross
to which Ciaran had clung so desperately. He kneeled in the last wretched
extreme of submission, baring a throat already symbolically slit. “Here am I,” he said in a toneless
whisper. “I can run no further, I am forfeit. Now take me!” Matthew stood motionless, staring at that
savage cut the cord had left before it broke. The silence grew too heavy to be bearable,
and still he had no word to say, and his face was a blank mask in the
flickering light of the torches. “He says right,” said Cadfael, very softly
and reasonably. “He is yours fairly. The terms of his penance are broken, and
his life is forfeit. Take him!” There was no sign that Matthew so much as
heard him, but for the spasmodic tightening of his lips, as if in pain. He
never took his eyes from the wretch kneeling humbly before him. “You have followed him faithfully, and
kept the terms laid down,” Cadfael urged gently. “You are under vow. Now finish
the work!” He was on safe enough ground, and sure of
it now. The act of submission had already finished the work, there was no more
to be done. With his enemy at his mercy, and every justification for the act of
vengeance, the avenger was helpless, the prisoner of his own nature. There was
nothing left in him but a drear sadness, a sick revulsion of disgust and
self-disgust. How could he kill a wretched, broken man, kneeling here
unresisting, waiting for his death? Death was no longer relevant. “It is over, Luc,” said Cadfael softly.
“Do what you must.” Matthew stood mute a moment longer, and if
he had heard his true name spoken, he gave no sign, it was of no importance.
After the abandonment of all purpose came the awful sense of loss and
emptiness. He opened his bloodstained hand and let the dagger slip from his
fingers into the grass. He turned away like a blind man, feeling with a
stretched foot for every step, groped his way through the curtain of bushes,
and vanished into the darkness. Olivier drew in breath sharply, and
started out of his tranced stillness to catch eagerly at Cadfael’s arm. “Is it
true? You have found him out? He is Luc Meverel?” He accepted the truth of it
without another word said, and sprang ardently towards the place where the
bushes still stirred after Luc’s passing, and he would have been off in pursuit
at a run if Hugh had not caught at his arm to detain him. “Wait but one moment! You also have a
cause here, if Cadfael is right. This is surely the man who murdered your
friend. He owes you a death. He is yours if you want him.” “That is truth,” said Cadfaei. “Ask him!
He will tell you.” Ciaran crouched in the grass, drooping
now, bewildered and lost, no longer looking any man in the face, only waiting
without hope or understanding for someone to determine whether he was to live
or die, and on what abject terms. Olivier cast one wondering glance at him,
shook his head in emphatic rejection, and reached for his horse’s bridle. “Who am
I,” he said, “to exact what Luc Meverel has remitted? Let this one go on his
way with his own burden. My business is with the other.” He was away at a run, leading the horse
briskly through the screen of bushes, and the rustling of their passage gradually
stilled again into silence. Cadfael and Hugh were left regarding each other
mutely across the lamentable figure crouched upon the ground. Gradually the rest of the world flowed
back into Cadfael’s ken. Three of Hugh’s officers stood aloof with the horses
and the torches, looking on in silence; and somewhere not far distant sounded a
brief scuffle and outcry, as one of the fugitives was overpowered and made
prisoner. Simeon Poer had been pulled down barely fifty yards in cover, and
stood sullenly under guard now, with his wrists secured to a sergeant’s
stirrup-leather. The third would not be a free man long. This night’s ventures
were over. This piece of woodland would be safe even for barefoot and unarmed
pilgrims to traverse. “What is to be done with him?” demanded
Hugh openly, looking down upon the wreckage of a man with some distaste. “Since Luc has waived his claim,” said
Cadfael, “I would not dare meddle. And there is something at least to be said
for him, he did not cheat or break his terms voluntarily, even when there was
no one by to accuse him. It is a small virtue to have to advance for the
defence of a life, but it is something. Who else has the right to foreclose on
what Luc has spared?” Ciaran raised his head, peering doubtfully
from one face to the other, still confounded at being so spared, but beginning
to believe that he still lived. He was weeping, whether with pain, or relief,
or something more durable than either, there was no telling. The blood was
blackening into a dark line about his throat. “Speak up and tell truth,” said Hugh with
chill gentleness. “Was it you who stabbed Bossard?” Out of the pallid disintegration of
Ciaran’s face a wavering voice said: “Yes.” “Why did you so? Why attack the queen’s
clerk, who did nothing but deliver his errand faithfully?” Ciaran’s eyes burned for an instant, and a
fleeting spark of past pride, intolerance and rage showed like the last glow of
a dying fire. “He came high-handed, shouting down the lord bishop, defying the
council. My master was angry and affronted…” “Your master,” said Cadfael, “was the
prior of Hyde Mead. Or so you claimed.” “How could I any longer claim service with
one who had discarded me? I lied! The lord bishop himself, I served Bishop
Henry, had his favour. Lost, lost now! I could not brook the man Christian’s
insolence to him… he stood against everything my lord planned and willed. I
hated him! I thought then that I hated him,” said Ciaran, drearily wondering at
the recollection. “And I thought to please my lord!” “A calculation that went awry,” said
Cadfael, “for whatever he may be, Henry of Blois is no murderer. And Rainard
Bossard prevented your mischief, a man of your own party, held in esteem. Did
that make him a traitor in your eyes—that he should respect an honest opponent?
Or did you strike out at random, and kill without intent?” “No,” said the level, lame voice, bereft
of its brief spark. “He thwarted me, I was enraged. I knew
what I did. I was glad… then!” he said, and drew bitter breath. “And who laid upon you this penitential
journey?” asked Cadfael, “and to what end? Your life was granted you, upon
terms. What terms? Someone in the highest authority laid that load upon you.” “My lord the bishop-legate,” said Ciaran,
and wrung wordlessly for a moment at the pain of an old devotion, rejected and
banished now for ever. “There was no other soul knew of it, only to him I told
it. He would not give me up to law, he wanted this thing put by, for fear it
should threaten his plans for the empress’s peace. But he would not condone. I
am from the Danish kingdom of Dublin, my other half Welsh. He offered me
passage under his protection to Bangor, to the bishop there, who would see me
to Caergybi in Anglesey, and have me put aboard a ship for Dublin. But I must
go barefoot all that way, and wear the cross round my neck, and if ever I broke
those terms, even for a moment, my life was his who cared to take it, without
blame or penalty. And I could never return.” Another fire, of banished love,
ruined ambition, rejected service, flamed through the broken accents for a
moment, and died of despair. “Yet if this sentence was never made
public,” said Hugh, seizing upon one thing still unexplained, “how did Luc
Meverel ever come to know of it and follow you?” “Do I know?” The voice was flat and drear,
worn out with exhaustion. “All I know is that I set out from Winchester, and
where the roads joined, near Newbury, this man stood and waited for me, and
fell in beside me, and every step of my way on this journey he has gone on my
heels like a demon, and waited for me to play false to my sentence, for there
was no point of it he did not know!, to take my life without guilt, without a
qualm, as so he might. He trod after me wherever I trod, he never let me from
his sight, he made no secret of his wants, he tempted me to go aside, to put on
shoes, to lay by the cross, and sirs, it was deathly heavy! Matthew, he called
himself… Luc, you say he is? You know him? I never
knew… He said I had killed his lord, whom he loved, and he would follow me to
Bangor, to Caergybi, even to Dublin if ever I got aboard ship without putting
off the cross or putting on shoes. But he would have me in the end. He had what
he lusted for, why did he turn away and spare?” The last words ached with his
uncomprehending wonder. “He did not find you worth the killing,”
said Cadfael, as gently and mercifully as he could, but honestly. “Now he goes
in anguish and shame because he spent so much time on you that might have been
better spent. It is a matter of values. Study to learn what is worth and what
is not, and you may come to understand him.” “I am a dead man while I live,” said
Ciaran, writhing, “without master, without friends, without a cause…” “All three you may find, if you seek. Go
where you were sent, bear what you were condemned to bear, and look for the
meaning,” said Cadfael. “For so must we all.” He turned away with a sigh. No way of
knowing how much good words might do, or the lessons of life, no telling
whether any trace of compunction moved in Ciaran’s bludgeoned mind, or whether
all his feeling was still for himself. Cadfael felt himself suddenly very
tired. He looked at Hugh with a somewhat lopsided smile. “I wish I were home.
What now, Hugh? Can we go?” Hugh stood looking down with a frown at
the confessed murderer, sunken in the grass like a broken-backed serpent,
submissive, tear-stained, nursing minor injuries. A piteous spectacle, though
pity might be misplaced. Yet he was, after all, no more than twenty-five or so
years old, able-bodied, well-clothed, strong, his continued journey might be
painful and arduous, but it was not beyond his powers, and he had his bishop’s
ring still, effective wherever law held. These three footpads now tethered fast
and under guard would trouble his going no more. Ciaran would surely reach his
journey’s end safely, however long it might take him. Not the journey’s end of
his false story, a blessed death in Aberdaron and burial among the saints of
Ynys Ennli, but a return to his native place, and a life beginning afresh. He
might even be changed. He might well adhere to his hard terms all the way to
Caergybi, where Irish ships plied, even as far as Dublin, even to his ransomed
life’s end. How can you tell? “Make your own way from here,” said Hugh,
“as well as you may. You need fear nothing now from footpads here, and the
border is not far. What you have to fear from God, take up with God.” He turned his back, with so decisive a
movement that his men recognised the sign that all was over, and stirred
willingly about the captives and the horses. “And those two?” asked Hugh. “Had I not
better leave a man behind on the track there, with a spare horse for Luc? He
followed his quarry afoot, but no need for him to foot it back. Or ought I to
send men after them?” “No need for that,” said Cadfael with
certainty. “Olivier will manage all. They’ll come home together.” He had no qualms at all, he was beginning
to relax into the warmth of content. The evil he had dreaded had been averted,
however narrowly, at whatever cost. Olivier would find his stray, bear with
him, follow if he tried to avoid, wrung and ravaged as he was, with the sole
obsessive purpose of his life for so long ripped away from him, and within him
only the aching emptiness where that consuming passion had been. Into that
barren void Olivier would win his way, and warm the ravished heart to make it
habitable for another love. There was the most comforting of messages to bring
from Juliana Bossard, the promise regained of a home and a welcome. There was a
future. How had Matthew-Luc seen his future when he emptied his purse of the
last coin at the abbey, before taking up the pursuit of his enemy? Surely he
had been contemplating the end of the person he had hitherto been, a total
ending, beyond which he could not see. Now he was young again, there was a life
before him, it needed only a little time to make him whole again. Olivier would bring him back to the abbey,
when the worst desolation was over. For Olivier had promised that he would not
leave without spending some time leisurely with Cadfael, and upon Olivier’s
promise the heart could rest secure. As for the other… Cadfael looked back from
the saddle, after they had mounted, and saw the last of Ciaran, still on his
knees under the tree, where they had left him. His face was turned to them, but
his eyes seemed to be closed, and his hands were wrung tightly together before
his breast. He might have been praying, he might have been simply experiencing
with every particle of his flesh the life that had been left to him. When we
are all gone, thought Cadfael, he will fall asleep there where he lies, he can
do no other, for he is far gone in something beyond exhaustion. Where he falls
asleep, there he will have died. But when he awakes, I trust he may understand
that he has been born again. The slower cortege that would bring the
prisoners into the town began to assemble, making the tethering thongs secure,
and the torch-bearers crossed the clearing to mount, withdrawing their yellow
light from the kneeling figure, so that Ciaran vanished gradually, as though he
had been absorbed into the bole of the beech-tree. Hugh led the way out to the track, and
turned homeward. “Oh, Hugh, I grow old!” said Cadfael, hugely yawning. “I want
my bed.” Chapter Fifteen IT WAS PAST MIDNIGHT when they rode in at
the gatehouse, into a great court awash with moonlight, and heard the chanting
of Matins within the church. They had made no haste on the way home, and said
very little, content to ride companionably together as sometimes before,
through summer night or winter day. It would be another hour or more yet before
Hugh’s officers got their prisoners back to Shrewsbury Castle, since they must
keep a foot-pace, but before morning Simeon Poer and his henchmen would be safe
in hold, under lock and key. “I’ll wait with you until Lauds is over,”
said Hugh, as they dismounted at the gatehouse. “Father Abbot will want to know
how we’ve sped. Though I hope he won’t require the whole tale from us tonight.” “Come down with me to the stables, then,”
said Cadfael, “and I’ll see this fellow unsaddled and tended, while they’re
still within. I was always taught to care for my beast before seeking my own
rest. You never lose the habit.” In the stable-yard the moonlight was all
the light they needed. The quietness of midnight and the stillness of the air
carried every note of the office to them softly and clearly. Cadfael unsaddled
his horse and saw him settled and provided in his stall, with a light rug
against any possible chill, rites he seldom had occasion to perform now. They
brought back memories of other mounts and other journeys, and battlefields less
happily resolved than the small but desperate skirmish just lost and won. Hugh stood watching with his back turned
to the great court, but his head tilted to follow the chant. Yet it was not any
sound of an approaching step that made him look round sudenly, but the slender
shadow that stole along the moonlit cobbles beside his feet. And there hesitant
in the gateway of the yard stood Melangell, startled and startling, haloed in
that pallid sheen. “Child,” said Cadfael, concerned, “what
are you doing out of your bed at this hour?” “How could I rest?” she said, but not as
one complaining. “No one misses me, they are all sleeping.” She stood very
still and straight, as if she had spent all the hours since he had left her in
earnest endeavour to put away for ever any memories he might have of the
tear-stained, despairing girl who had sought solitude in his workshop. The
great sheaf of her hair was braided and pinned up on her head, her gown was
trim, and her face resolutely calm as she asked, “Did you find him?” A girl he had left her, a woman he came
back to her. “Yes,” said Cadfael, “we found them both. There has nothing ill
happened to either. The two of them have parted. Ciaran goes on his way alone.” “And Matthew?” she asked steadily. “Matthew is with a good friend, and will
come to no harm. We two have outridden them, but they will come.” She would
have to learn to call him by another name now, but let the man himself tell her
that. Nor would the future be altogether easy, for her or for Luc Meverel, two
human creatures who might never have been brought within hail of each other but
for freakish circumstance. Unless Saint Winifred had had a hand in that, too?
On this night Cadfael could believe it, and trust her to bring all to a good
end. “He will come back,” said Cadfael, meeting her candid eyes, that bore no
trace of tears now. “You need not fear. But he has suffered a great turmoil of
the mind, and he’ll need all your patience and wisdom. Ask him nothing. When
the time is right he will tell you everything. Reproach him with nothing.” “God forbid,” she said,”that I should ever
reproach him. It was I who failed him.” “No, how could you know? But when he
comes, wonder at nothing. Be like one who is thirsty and drinks. And so will
he.” She had turned a little towards him, and
the moonlight blanched wonderfully over her face, as if a lamp within her had
been newly lighted. “I will wait,” she said. “Better go to your bed and sleep, the
waiting may be longer than you think, he has been wrung. But he will come.” But at that she shook her head. “I’ll
watch till he comes,” she said, and suddenly smiled at them, pale and lustrous
as pearl, and turned and went away swiftly and silently towards the cloister. “That is the girl you spoke of?” asked
Hugh, looking after her with somewhat frowning interest. “The lame boy’s
sister? The girl that young man fancies?” “That is she,” said Cadfael, and closed
the half-door of the stall. “The weaver-woman’s niece?” “That, too. Dowerless and from common
stock,” said Cadfael, understanding but untroubled. “Yes, true! I’m from common
stock myself. I doubt if a young fellow who has been torn apart and remade as
Luc has tonight will care much about such little things. Though I grant you
others may! I hope the lady Juliana has no plans yet for marrying him off to
some heiress from a neighbour manor, for I fancy things have gone so far now
with these two that she’ll be forced to abandon her plans. A manor or a craft,
if you take pride in them, and run them well, where’s the difference?” “Your common stock,” said Hugh heartily,
“gave growth to a most uncommon shoot! And I wouldn’t say but that young thing
would grace a hall better than many a highbred dame I’ve seen. But listen,
they’re ending. We’d best present ourselves.” Abbot Radulfus came from Matins and Lauds
with his usual imperturbable stride, and found them waiting for him as he left
the cloister. This day of miracles had produced a fittingly glorious night,
incredibly lofty and deep, coruscating with stars, washed white with moonlight.
Coming from the dimness within, this exuberance of light showed him clearly
both the serenity and the weariness on the two faces that confronted him. “You are back!” he said, and looked beyond
them. “But not all! Messire de Bretagne, you said he had gone by a wrong way.
He has not returned here. You have not encountered him?” “Yes, Father, we have,” said Hugh. “All is
well with him, and he has found the young man he was seeking. They will return
here, all in good time.” “And the evil you feared, Brother Cadfael?
You spoke of another death…” “Father,” said Cadfael, “no harm has come
tonight to any but the masterless men who escaped into the forest there. They
are now safe in hold, and on their way under guard to the castle. The death I
dreaded has been averted, no threat remains in that quarter to any man. I said,
if the two young men could be overtaken, the better surely for one, and perhaps
for both. Father, they were overtaken in time, and better for both it surely
must be.” “Yet there remains,” said Radulfus,
pondering, “the print of blood, which both you and I have seen. You said, you
will recall, that, yes, we have entertained a murderer among us. Do you still
say so?” “Yes, Father. Yet not as you suppose. When
Olivier de Bretagne and Luc Meverel return, then all can be made plain, for as
yet,” said Cadfael, “there are still certain things we do not know. But we do
know,” he said firmly, “that what has passed this night is the best for which
we could have prayed, and we have good need to give thanks for it.” “So all is well?” “All is very well, Father.” “Then the rest may wait for morning. You
need rest. But will you not come in with me and take some food and wine, before
you sleep?” “My wife,” said Hugh, gracefully evading,
“will be in some anxiety for me. You are kind, Father, but I would not have her
fret longer than she need.” The abbot eyed them both, and did not
press them. “And God bless you for that!” sighed
Cadfael, toiling up the slight slope of the court towards the dortoir stair and
the gatehouse where Hugh had hitched his horse. “For I’m asleep on my feet, and
even a good wine could not revive me.” The moonlight was gone, and there was as
yet no sunlight, when Olivier de Bretagne and Luc Meverel rode slowly in at the
abbey gatehouse. How far they had wandered in the deep night neither of them
knew very clearly, for this was strange country to both. Even when overtaken,
and addressed with careful gentleness, Luc had still gone forward blindly,
hands hanging slack at his sides or vaguely parting the bushes, saying nothing,
hearing nothing, unless some core of feeling within him was aware of this calm,
relentless pursuit by a tolerant, incurious kindness, and distantly wondered at
it. When he had dropped at last and lain down in the lush grass of a meadow at
the edge of the forest, Olivier had tethered his horse a little apart and lain
down beside him, not too close, yet so close that the mute man knew he was
there, waiting without impatience. Past midnight Luc had fallen asleep. It was
his greatest need. He was a man ravished and emptied of every impulse that had
held him alive for the past two months, a dead man still walking and unable
quite to die. Sleep was his ransom. Then he could truly die to this waste of
loss and bitterness, the awful need that had driven him, the corrosive grief
that had eaten his heart out for his lord, who had died in his arms, on his
shoulder, on his heart. The bloodstain that would not wash out, no matter how
he laboured over it, was his witness. He had kept it to keep the fire of his
hatred white-hot. Now in sleep he was delivered from all. And he had awakened in the first
mysterious pre-dawn stirring of the earliest summer birds, beginning to call
tentatively into the silence, to open his eyes upon a face bending over him, a
face he did not know, but remotely desired to know, for it was vivid, friendly
and calm, waiting courteously on his will. “Did I kill him?” Luc had asked, somehow
aware that the man who bore this face would know the answer. “No,” said a voice clear, serene and low.
“There was no need. But he’s dead to you. You can forget him.” He did not understand that, but he
accepted it. He sat up in the cool, ripe grass, and his senses began to stir
again, and record distantly that the earth smelled sweet, and there were paling
stars in the sky over him, caught like stray sparks in the branches of the
trees. He stared intently into Olivier’s face, and Olivier looked back at him
with a slight, serene smile, and was silent. “Do I know you?” asked Luc wonderingly. “No. But you will. My name is Olivier de
Bretagne, and I serve Laurence d’Angers, just as your lord did. I knew Rainald
Bossard well, he was my friend, we came from the Holy Land together in
Laurence’s train. And I am sent with a message to Luc Meverel, and that, I am
sure, is your name.” “A message to me?” Luc shook his head. “From your cousin and lady, Juliana
Bossard. And the message is that she begs you to come home, for she needs you,
and there is no one who can take your place.” He was slow to believe, still numbed and
hollow within; but there was no impulsion for him to go anywhere or do anything
now of his own will, and he yielded indifferently to Olivier’s promptings. “Now
we should be getting back to the abbey,” said Olivier practically, and rose,
and Luc responded, and rose with him. “You take the horse, and I’ll walk,” said
Olivier, and Luc did as he was bidden. It was like nursing a simpleton gently
along the way he must go, and holding him by the hand at every step. They found their way back at last to the
old track, and there were the two horses Hugh had left behind for them, and the
groom fast asleep in the grass beside them. Olivier took back his own horse,
and Luc mounted the fresh one, with the lightness and ease of custom, his
body’s instincts at least reawakening. The yawning groom led the way, knowing
the path well. Not until they were halfway back towards the Meole brook and the
narrow bridge to the highroad did Luc say a word of his own volition. “You say she wants me to come back,” he
said abruptly, with quickening pain and hope in his voice. “Is it true? I left
her without a word, but what else could I do? What can she think of me now?” “Why, that you had your reasons for
leaving her, as she has hers for wanting you back. Half the length of England I
have been asking after you, at her entreaty. What more do you need?” “I never thought to return,” said Luc,
staring back down that long, long road in wonder and doubt. No, not even to Shrewsbury, much less to
his home in the south. Yet here he was, in the cool, soft morning twilight well
before Prime, riding beside this young stranger over the wooden bridge that
crossed the Meole brook, instead of wading through the shrunken stream to the
pease fields, the way by which he had left the enclave. Round to the highroad,
past the mill and the pond, and in at the gatehouse to the great court. There
they lighted down, and the groom took himself and his two horses briskly away
again towards the town. Luc stood gazing about him dully, still
clouded by the unfamiliarity of everything he beheld, as if his senses were
still dazed and clumsy with the effort of coming back to life. At this hour the
court was empty. No, not quite empty. There was someone sitting on the stone
steps that climbed to the door of the guest-hall, sitting there alone and quite
composedly, with her face turned towards the gate, and as he watched she rose
and came down the wide steps, and walked towards him with a swift, light step.
Then he knew her for Melangell. In her at least there was nothing
unfamiliar. The sight of her brought back colour and form and reality into the
very stones of the wall at her back, and the cobbles under her feet. The
elusive grey between-light could not blur the outlines of head and hand, or dim
the brightness of her hair. Life came flooding back into Luc with a shock of
pain, as feeling returns after a numbing wound. She came towards him with hands
a little extended and face raised, and the faintest and most anxious of smiles
on her lips and in her eyes. Then, as she hesitated for the first time, a few
paces from him, he saw the dark stain of the bruise that marred her cheek. It was the bruise that shattered him. He
shook from head to heels in a great convulsion of shame and grief, and
blundered forward blindly into her arms, which reached gladly to receive him.
On his knees, with his arms wound about her and his face buried in her breast,
he burst into a storm of tears, as spontaneous and as healing as Saint
Winifred’s own miraculous spring. He was in perfect command of voice and
face when they met after chapter in the abbot’s parlour, abbot, prior, Brother
Cadfael, Hugh Beringar, Olivier and Luc, to set right in all its details the account
of Rainald Bossard’s death, and all that had followed from it. “Unwittingly I deceived you, Father,” said
Cadfael, harking back to the interview which had sent him forth in such haste.
“When you asked if we had entertained a murderer unawares, I answered truly
that I did think so, but that we might yet have time to prevent a second death.
I never realised until afterwards how you might interpret that, seeing we had
just found the blood-stained shirt. But, see, the man who struck the blow might
be spattered as to sleeve or collar, but he would not be marked by this great
blot that covered breast and shoulder over the heart. No, that was rather the
sign of one who had held a wounded man, a man wounded to death, in his arms as
he died. Nor would the slayer, if his clothing was blood-stained, have kept and
carried it with him, but burned or buried it, or somehow rid himself of it. But
this shirt, though washed most carefully, still bore the outline of the stain
clear to be seen, and it was carried as a sacred relic is carried, perhaps as a
pledge to exact vengeance. So I knew that this same Luc whom we knew as
Matthew, and in whose scrip the talisman was found, was not the murderer. But
when I recalled all the words I had heard those two young men speak, and all
the evidence of devoted attendance, the one on the other, then suddenly I saw
that pairing in the utterly opposed way, as a pursuit. And I feared it must be
to the death.” The abbot looked at Luc, and asked simply:
“Is that a true reading?” “Father, it is.” Luc set forth with
deliberation the progress of his own obsession, as though he discovered it and
understood it only in speaking. “I was with my lord that night, close to the
Old Minster it was, when four or five set on the clerk, and my lord ran, and we
with him, to beat them off. And then they fled, but one turned back and struck.
I saw it done, and it was done of intent! I had my lord in my arms, he had been
good to me, and I loved him,” said Luc with grimly measured moderation and
burning eyes as he remembered. “He was dead in a mere moment, in the twinkling
of an eye… And I had seen where the murderer fled, into the passage by the
chapter house. I went after him, and I heard their voices in the sacristy,
Bishop Henry had come from the chapter house after the council ended for the
night, and there Ciaran had found him and fell on his knees to him, blurting
out all. I lay in hiding, and heard every word. I think he even hoped for
praise,” said Luc with bitter deliberation. “Is it possible?” wondered Prior Robert,
shocked to the heart. “Bishop Henry could not for one moment connive at or
condone an act so evil.” “No, he did not condone. But neither would
he deliver over one of his own intimate servants as a murderer. To do him
justice,” said Luc, but with plain distaste, “his concern was not to cause
further anger and quarrelling, but to put away and smooth over everything that
threatened the empress’s fortunes and the peace he was trying to make. But
condone murder, no, that he would not. Therefore I overheard the sentence he
laid upon Ciaran, though then I did not know who he was, nor that Ciaran was
his name. He banished him back to his Dublin home, for ever, and condemned him
to go every step of the way to Bangor and to the ship at Caergybi barefoot, and
carrying that heavy cross. And if ever he put on shoes or laid by the cross
from round his neck, then his forfeit life was no longer spared, but might be
taken by whoever willed, without sin or penalty. But see,” said Luc, merciless
in judgement, “how he cheated! For not only did he give his creature the ring
that would ensure him the protection of the church to Bangor, but also, mark,
not one word was ever made public of this guilt or this sentence, so how was
that forfeit life in danger? No one was to know of it but they two, if God had
not prevented and brought there a witness to hear the sentence and take upon
himself the vengeance due.” “As you did,” said the abbot, and his
voice was even and calm, avoiding judgement. “As I did, Father. For as Ciaran swore to
keep the terms laid down on pain of death, so did I swear an oath as solemn to
follow him the length of the land, and if ever he broke his terms for a moment,
to have his life as payment for my lord.” “And how,” asked Radulfus in the same mild
tone, “did you know what man you were thus to hunt to his death? For you say
you did not see his face clearly or know his name then.” “I knew the way he was bound to go, and
the day of his setting out. I waited by the roadside for one walking north, barefoot,
and one not used to going barefoot, but very well shod,” said Luc with a brief,
wry smile. “I saw the cross at his neck. I fell in at his side, and I told him,
not who I was, but what. I took another name, so that no failure nor shame of
mine should ever cast a shadow on my lady or her house. One Evangelist in
exchange for another! Step for step with him I went all this way, here to this
place, and never let him from my sight and reach, night or day, and never let
him forget that I meant to be his death. He could not ask help to rid himself
of me, since I could then as easily strip him of his pilgrim holiness and show
what he really was. And I could not denounce him, partly for fear of Bishop
Henry, partly because neither did I want more feuding between factions, my feud
was between two men!, but chiefly because he was mine, mine, and I would not
let any other vengeance or danger reach him. So we kept together, he trying to
elude me, but he was court-bred and tender and crippled by the miles, and I holding
fast to him, and waiting.” He looked up suddenly and caught the
abbot’s compassionate but calm eyes upon him, and his own eyes were wide, dark
and clear. “It is not beautiful, I know. Neither was murder beautiful. And this
blotch was only mine, my lord went to his grave immaculate, defending one
opposed to him.” It was Olivier, silent until now, who said
softly: “And so did you!” The grave, thought Cadfael at the height of the Mass,
had closed firmly to deny Luc entrance, but that arm outstretched between his
enemy and the knives of three assailants must never be forgotten. Hell had also
shut its mouth and refused to devour him. He was young, clean, alive again
after a kind of death. Yes, Olivier had uttered truth. His own life ventured,
his enemy’s life defended, what was there between Luc and his lord but the
accident, the vain and random accident, of the death itself? He recalled also, when he was most
diligent in prayer, that these few days while Saint Winifred was manifesting
her virtue in disentangling the troubled lives of some half-dozen people in
Shrewsbury, were also the vital days when the fates of Englishmen in general
were being determined, perhaps with less compassion and wisdom. For by this
time the date of the empress’s coronation might well be settled, the crown even
now placed upon her head. No doubt God and the saints had that consideration in
mind, too. Matthew-Luc came once again to ask
audience of the abbot, a little before Vespers. Radulfus had him admitted
without question, and sat with him alone, divining his present need. “Father, will you hear me my confession?
For I need absolution from the vow I could not keep. And I do earnestly desire
to be clean of the past before I undertake the future.” “It is a right and a wise desire,” said
Radulfus. “One thing tell me, are you asking absolution for failing to fulfil
the oath you swore?” Luc, already on his knees, raised his head
for a moment from the abbot’s knee, and showed a face open and clear. “No,
Father, but for ever swearing such an oath. Even grief has its arrogance.” “Then you have learned, my son, that
vengeance belongs only to God?” “More than that, Father,” said Luc. “I
have learned that in God’s hands vengeance is safe. However long delayed,
however strangely manifested, the reckoning is sure.” When it was done, when he had raked out of
his heart, with measured voice and long pauses for thought, every drifted grain
of rancour and bitterness and impatience that fretted him, and received
absolution, he rose with a great sigh, and raised a bright and resolute face. “Now, Father, if I may pray of you one
more grace, let me have one of your priests to join me to a wife before I go
from here. Here, where I am made clean and new, I would have love and life
begin together.” Chapter Sixteen ON THE NEXT MORNING, which was the
twenty-fourth day of June, the general bustle of departure began. There was
packing of belongings, buying and parcelling of food and drink for the journey,
and much leave-taking from friends newly made, and arranging of company for the
road. No doubt the saint would have due regard for her own reputation, and keep
the June sun shining until all her devotees were safely home, and with a
wonderful tale to tell. Most of them knew only half the wonder, but even that was
wonder enough. Among the early departures went Brother
Adam of Reading, in no great hurry along the way, for today he would go no
farther than Reading’s daughter-house of Leominster, where there would be
letters waiting for him to carry home to his abbot. He set out with a pouch
well filled with seeds of species his garden did not yet possess, and a
scholarly mind still pondering the miraculous healing he had witnessed from
every theological angle, in order to be able to expound its full significance
when he reached his own monastery. It had been a most instructive and
enlightening festival. “I’d meant to start for home today, too,”
said Mistress Weaver to her cronies Mistress Glover and the apothecary’s widow,
with whom she had formed a strong matronly alliance during these memorable
days, “but now there’s such work doing, I hardly know whether I’m waking or
sleeping, and I must stay over yet a night or two. Who’d ever have thought what
would come of it, when I told my lad we ought to come and make our prayers here
to the good saint, and have faith that she’d be listening? Now it seems I’m to
lose the both of them, my poor sister’s chicks; for Rhun, God bless him, is set
on staying here and taking the cowl, for he says he won’t ever leave the
blessed girl who healed him. And truly I don’t wonder at it, and won’t stand in
his way, for he’s too good for this wicked world outside, so he is! And now
comes young Matthew, no, but it seems we must call him Luc, now, and he’s
well-born, if from a poor landless branch, and will come in for a manor or two
in time, by his good kinswoman’s taking him in…” “Well, and so did you take the boy and
girl in,” pointed out the apothecary’s widow warmly, “and gave them a roof and
a living. There’s good sound justice there.” “Well, so Matthew, I mean Luc, he comes to
me and asks for my girl for his wife, last night it was, and when I answered
honestly, for honest I am and always will be, that my Melangell has but a
meagre dowry, though the best I can give her I will, what says he? That as at
this moment he himself has not one penny to his name in this world, but must go
debtor to the young lord’s charity that came to find him, and as for the
future, if fortune favours him he’ll be thankful, and if not, he has hands and
a will, and can make a way for two to live. Provided the other is my girl, he
says, for there’s none other for him. So what can I say but God bless them
both, and stay to see them wedded?” “It’s a woman’s duty,” said Mistress
Glover heartily, “to make sure all’s done properly, when she hands over a young
girl to a husband. But sure, you’ll miss the two of them.” “So I will,” agreed Dame Alice, shedding a
few tears rather of pride and joy than of grief, at the advancement to
semi-sainthood and promising matrimony of the charges who had cost her dear
enough, and could now be blessed and sped on their respective and respectable
ways with a quiet mind. “So I will! But to see them both set up where they
would be… And good children both, that will take pains for me when I come to
need, as I have for them.” “And they’re to marry here, tomorrow?”
asked the apothecary’s widow, visibly considering putting off her own departure
for another day. “They are indeed, before Mass in the
morning. So it seems I’ll have none to take home but my sole self,” said Dame
Alice, dropping another proud tear or two, and wearing her reflected glory with
admirable grace, “when I take to the road again. But the day after tomorrow
there’s a sturdy company leaving southward, and with them I’ll go.” “And duty well done, my dear soul,” said
Mistress Glover, embracing her friend in a massive arm, “duty very well done!” They were married in the privacy of the
Lady Chapel, by Brother Paul, who was not only master of the novices, but the
chief of their confessors, too, and already had Rhun under his care and
instruction, and felt a fatherly interest in him, which the boy’s affection
very readily extended to embrace the sister. No one else was present but the
family and their witnesses, and the bridal pair wore no festal garments, for
they had none. Luc was in the serviceable brown cotte and hose he had slept in,
out in the fields, and the same crumpled shirt, though newly washed and
smoothed. Melangell was neat and modest in her homespun, proudly balancing her
coronal of braided, deep-gold hair. They were pale as lilies, bright as stars,
and solemn as the grave. After high and moving events, daily life
must still go on. Cadfael went to his work that afternoon well content. With
the meadow grasses in ripe seed and the harvest imminent he had preparations to
make for two seasonal ailments which could be relied upon to recur every year.
There were some who suffered with eruptions on their hands when working in the
harvest, and others who took to sneezing and wheezing, with running eyes, and
needed lotions to help them. He was busy bruising fresh leaves of dock
and mandrake in a mortar for a soothing ointment, when he heard light,
long-striding steps approaching along the gravel of the path, and then half of
the sunlight from the wide-open door was cut off, as someone hesitated in the
doorway. He turned with the mortar hugged to his chest, and the green-stained
wooden pestle arrested in his hand, and there stood Olivier, dipping his tall
head to evade the hanging bunches of herbs, and asking, in the mellow,
confident voice of one assured of the answer, “May I come in?” He was in already, smiling, staring about
him with a boy’s candid curiosity, for he had never been here before. “I’ve
been a truant, I know, but with two days to wait before Luc’s marriage I
thought best to get on with my errand to the sheriff of Stafford, being so
close, and then come back here. I was back, as I said I’d be, in time to see
them wedded. I thought you would have been there.” “So I would, but I was called out to Saint
Giles. Some poor soul of a beggar stumbled in there overnight covered with
sores, they were afraid of a contagion, but it’s no such matter. If he’d had
treatment earlier it would have been an easy matter to cure him, but a week or
so resting in the hospital will do him no harm. Our pair of youngsters here had
no need of me. I’m a part of what’s over and done with for them, you’re a part
of what’s beginning.” “Melangell told me where I should find
you, however, you were missed. And here I am.” “And as welcome as the day,” said Cadfael,
laying his mortar aside. Long, shapely hands gripped both his hands heartily,
and Olivier stooped his olive cheek for the greeting kiss, as simply as for the
parting kiss when they had separated at Bromfield. “Come, sit, let me offer you
wine, my own making. You knew, then, that those two would marry?” “I saw them meet, when I brought him back
here. Small doubt how it would end. Afterwards he told me his intent. When two are agreed, and know their own
minds,” said Olivier blithely, “everything else will give way. I shall see them
both properly provided for the journey home, since I must go by a more
roundabout way.” When two are agreed, and know their own
minds! Cadfael remembered confidences now a year and a half past. He poured
wine carefully, his hand being a shade less steady than usual, and sat down
beside his visitor, the young, wide shoulder firm and vital against his elderly
and stiff one, the clear, elegant profile close, and a pleasure to his eyes.
“Tell me,” he said, “about Ermina,” and was sure of the answer even before
Olivier turned on him his sudden blinding smile. “If I had known my travels would bring me
to you, I should have had so many messages to bring you, from both of them.
From Yves, and from my wife!” “Aaaah!” breathed Cadfael, on a deep,
delighted sigh. “So, as I thought, as I hoped! You have made good, then, what
you told me, that they would acknowledge your worth and give her to you.” Two,
there, who had indeed known their own minds, and been invincibly agreed! “When
was this match made?” “This Christmas past, in Gloucester. She
is there now, so is the boy. He is Laurence’s heir, just fifteen now. He wanted
to come to Winchester with us, but Laurence wouldn’t let him be put in peril.
They are safe, I thank God. If ever this chaos is ended,” said Olivier very
solemnly, “I will bring her to you, or you to her. She does not forget you.” “Nor I her, nor I her! Nor the boy. He
rode with me twice, asleep in my arms, I still recall the warmth and the shape
and the weight of him. A good boy as ever stepped!” “He’d be a load for you now,” said
Olivier, laughing. This year past, he’s shot up like a weed, he’ll be taller
than you.” “Ah, well, I’m beginning to shrink like a
spent weed. And you are happy?” asked Cadfael, thirsting for more blessedness
even than he already had. “You and she both?” “Beyond what I know how to express,” said
Olivier no less gravely. “How glad I am to have seen you again, and been able
to tell you so! Do you remember the last time? When I waited with you in
Bromfield to take Ermina and Yves home? And you drew me maps on the floor to
show me the ways?” There is a point at which joy is only just
bearable. Cadfael got up to refill the wine-cups, and turn his face away for a moment
from a brightness almost too bright. “Ah, now, if this is to be a contest in
“do-you-remembers” we shall be at it until Vespers, for not one detail of that
time have I forgotten. So let’s have this flask here within reach, and settle
down to it in comfort.” But there was an hour and more left before
Vespers when Hugh put an abrupt end to remembering. He came in haste, with a
face blazingly alert, and full of news. Even so he was slow to speak, not
wishing to exult openly in what must be only shock and dismay to Olivier. “There’s news. A courier rode in from
Warwick just now, they’re passing the word north by stages as fast as horse can
go.” They were both on their feet by then, intent upon his face, and waiting
for good or evil, for he contained it well. A good face for keeping secrets,
and under strong control now out of courteous consideration. “I fear,” he said,
“it will not come as gratefully to you, Olivier, as I own it does to me.” “From the south…” said Olivier, braced and
still. “From London? The empress?” “Yes, from London. All is overturned in a
day. There’ll be no coronation. Yesterday as they sat at dinner in Westminster,
the Londoners suddenly rang the tocsin, all the city bells. The entire town
came out in arms, and marched on Westminster. They’re fled, Olivier, she and
all her court, fled in the clothes they wore and with very little else, and the
city men have plundered the palace and driven out even the last hangers-on. She
never made move to win them, nothing but threats and reproaches and demands for
money ever since she entered. She’s let the crown slip through her fingers for
want of a few soft words and a queen’s courtesy. For your part,” said Hugh,
with real compunction, “I’m sorry! For mine, I find it a great deliverance.” “With that I find no fault,” said Olivier
simply. “Why should you not be glad? But she… she’s safe? They have not taken
her?” “No, according to the messenger she’s
safely away, with Robert of Gloucester and a few others as loyal, but the rest,
it seems, scattered and made off for their own lands, where they’d feel safe.
That’s the word as he brought it, barely a day old. The city of London was
being pressed hard from the south,” said Hugh, somewhat softening the load of
folly that lay upon the empress’s own shoulders, “with King Stephen’s queen
harrying their borders. To get relief their only way was to drive the empress
out and let the queen in, and their hearts were on her side, no question, of
the two they’d liefer have her.” “I knew,” said Olivier,”she was not wise,
the Empress Maud. I knew she could not forget grudges, no matter how sorely she
needed to close her eyes to them. I have seen her strip a man’s dignity from
him when he came submissive, offering support… Better at making enemies than
friends. All the more she needs,” he said, “the few she has. Where is she gone?
Did your messenger know?” “Westward for Oxford. And they’ll reach it
safely. The Londoners won’t follow so far, their part was only to drive her
out.” “And the bishop? Is he gone with her?” The
entire enterprise had rested upon the efforts of Henry of Blois, and he had
done his best for her, not entirely creditably but understandably and at
considerable cost, and his best she herself had undone. Stephen was a prisoner
in Bristol, but Stephen was still crowned and anointed king of England. No
wonder Hugh’s eyes shone. “Of the bishop I know nothing as yet. But
he’ll surely join her in Oxford. Unless…” “Unless he changes sides again,” Olivier
ended for him, and laughed. “It seems I shall have to leave you in more haste
than I expected,” he said with regret. “One fortune rises, another falls. No
sense in quarrelling with the lot.” “What will you do?” asked Hugh, watching
him steadily. “You know, I think, that whatever you may ask of us here, is
yours, and the choice is yours. Your horses are fresh. Your men will not yet
have heard the news, they’ll be waiting on your word. If you need stores for a
journey, take whatever you will. Or if you choose to stay…” Olivier shook his blue-black head, and the
clasping curves of glossy hair danced on his cheeks. “I must go. Not north,
where I was sent. What use in that, now? South for Oxford. Whatever she may be
else, she is my liege lord’s liege lady, where she is he will be, and where he
is, I go.” They eyed each other silently for a
moment, and Hugh said softly, quoting remembered words: “To tell you truth, now
I’ve met you I expected nothing less.” “I’ll go and rouse my men, and we’ll get
to horse. You’ll follow to your house, before I go? I must take leave of Lady
Beringar.” “I’ll follow you,” said Hugh. Olivier turned to Brother Cadfael without
a word but with the brief golden flash of a smile breaking through his roused
gravity for an instant, and again vanishing. “Brother… remember me in your
prayers!” He stooped his smooth cheek yet again in farewell, and as the elder’s
kiss was given he embraced Cadfael vehemently, with impulsive grace. “Until a
better time!” “God go with you!” said Cadfael. And he was gone, striding rapidly along
the gravel path, breaking into a light run, in no way disheartened or down, a
match for disaster or for triumph. At the corner of the box hedge he turned in
flight to look back, and waved a hand before he vanished. “I wish to God,” said Hugh, gazing after
him, “he was of our party! There’s an odd thing, Cadfael! Will you believe,
just then, when he looked round, I thought I saw something of you about him.
The set of the head, something…” Cadfael, too, was gazing out from the open
doorway to where the last sheen of blue had flashed from the burnished hair,
and the last echo of the light foot on the gravel died into silence. “Oh, no,”
he said absently, “he is altogether the image of his mother.” An unguarded utterance. Unguarded from
absence of mind, or design? The following silence did not trouble him,
he continued to gaze, shaking his head gently over the lingering vision, which
would stay with him through all his remaining years, and might even, by the
grace of God and the saints, be made flesh for him yet a third time. Far beyond
his deserts, but miracles are neither weighed nor measured, but as uncalculated
as the lightnings. “I recall,” said Hugh with careful
deliberation, perceiving that he was permitted to speculate, and had heard only
what he was meant to hear, “I do recall that he spoke of one for whose sake he
held the Benedictine order in reverence… one who had used him like a son…” Cadfael stirred, and looked round at him, smiling as
he met his friend’s fixed and thoughtful eyes. “I always meant to tell you,
some day,” he said tranquilly, “what he does not know, and never will from me.
He is my son.” About
the Author ELLIS PETERS is
the nom-de-crime of English novelist Edith Pargeter, author of scores of
books under her own name. She is the recipient of the Silver Dagger Award,
conferred by the Crime Writers Association in Britain, as well as the coveted
Edgar, awarded by the Mystery Writers of America. Miss Pargeter is also well
known as a translator of poetry and prose from the Czech and has been awarded
the Gold Medal and Ribbon of the Czechoslovak Society for Foreign Relations for
her services to Czech literature. She passed away in 1995, at the age of 82, at
home in her beloved Shropshire. |
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