Virgin in the Ice bc-6

by Ellis Peters

  Cadfael understood. Marriage by rape, once the thing was done, and privately, would be accepted by most families as preferable to causing an ugly scandal and starting a feud. No uncommon practice to take first and marry after.

  “I had a dagger,” she said grimly. “I have it still. It was I who wounded him, and I struck for his heart, but it went astray and ripped down from shoulder to arm. Well, you have seen …” She looked down at the folded habit that lay beside her on the bench. “And while he was raving and cursing and dripping blood, and they were running to staunch his wound and bandage him, 1 slipped out into the night and ran. He would follow me, that I knew. He could not afford to let me escape him, after that, marry or bury were the only ways. He would expect me to run towards the road and the town. Where else? So I did, but only until the woods covered my traces, and then I circled back and hid. I told you, I saw him ride out, weakened as he was, in a great rage, the way I knew he would go.”

  “Alone?”

  “Of course alone. He would not want witnesses for either rape or murder. Those within had their orders. And I saw him ride back, freshly bloodied through his bandages, though I thought nothing of it then but that he had exerted himself too rashly.” She shuddered at the thought of that exertion. “When he was cheated of me, he took out his venom on the first woman who fell in his way, and so avenged himself. For myself I would not have accused him. I had the better of him, and I had brought it on myself. But what had she done?”

  It was the eternal question, and the one to which there exists no answer. Why do the innocent suffer?

  “And yet,” she said doubtfully, “it may be true what he says. He was not used to being thwarted, it made him mad … He had a devil’s temper. God forgive me, I used almost to admire him for it once …”

  Yes, it might be true that he had killed without meaning to, and in panic sought to cover up his deed. Or it might be that he had reasoned coldly that a dead woman could never accuse him, and made sure of her eternal silence. Let those judge who were appointed to do the judging, here in this world.

  “Don’t tell Yves!” said Ermina. “I will do that, when the time comes. But not here. Not now!”

  No, there was no need to say any word to the boy of the battle that was over. Evrard Boterel was gone to Ludlow under armed escort, and there was no sign in the great court that ever a crime had been uncovered. Peace came back to Bromfield very softly, almost stealthily. In less than half an hour it would be time for Vespers.

  “After supper,” said Cadfael, “you should go to your bed, and get some hours of sleep, and the boy also. I will keep watch and let your squire in.”

  He had chosen his words well. It was like the coming of the thaw outside. She lifted her face to him like a flower opening, and all the bitter sadness of guilt and folly regretted melted away and fell from her before such a radiance that Cadfael’s eyes dazzled. From death and the past she leaned eagerly to life and the future. He did not think she was making any mistake this time, nor that any power would now turn her from her allegiance.

  There was a small congregation in the parish part of the church even at Compline that night, a dozen or so goodmen of the district, come to offer devout thanks for deliverance from terror. Even the weather partook of the general grace, for there was barely a touch of frost in the air, and the sky was clear and starry. Not a bad night for setting out on a journey.

  Cadfael knew what to look for by now, but for all that it took him a little time to single out the bowed black head for which he was searching. Marvelous that a creature so remarkable could become at will so unremarked. When Compline ended, it was no surprise to count the villagers leaving, and make them one less than had entered. Olivier could not only look like a local lad when he pleased, he could also vanish into shadow without a sound, and remain as still as the stones about him.

  They were all gone, the villagers to their homes, the brothers to the warming-room for half an hour of relaxation before bed. The chill dark bulk of the church was silent.

  “Olivier,” said Brother Cadfael, “come forth and be easy. Your wards are getting their rest until midnight, and have trusted you to me.”

  The shadows stirred, and gave forth the shape of a lean, lissome, youthful body, instantly advancing to be seen. He had not thought wise or fit to bring his sword with him into a sacred place. He trod without sound, light as a cat. “You know me?”

  “From her I know you. If the boy promised silence, be content, he has kept his word. She chose to trust me.”

  “Then so can I,” said the young man, and drew nearer. “You have privilege here? For I see you come and go as you please.”

  “I am not a brother of the house, but of Shrewsbury. I have a patient here mending, my justification for an irregular life. At the battle up there you saw him—the same distraught soul who marched into peril of his life and gave Yves the chance to break free.”

  “I am much in his debt.” The voice was low, earnest and assured. “And in yours, too, I think, for you must be the brother to whom the boy ran, the same of whom he spoke, the one who first brought him safe to this house. The name he gave you I do not remember.”

  “My name is Cadfael. Wait but a moment, till I look out and see if all are within …” In the sinking glow of torchlight, the last of the evening, the court showed its pattern of black and white as the paths crossed, empty, quiet and still. “Come!” said Cadfael. “We can offer you a warmer place to wait, if not a holier. I advised leaving while the brethren are at Matins and Lauds, for the porter will also attend, and I can let you out at the wicket in peace. But your horses?”

  “They are handy, and in shelter,” said Olivier serenely. “There is a boy goes with me, orphaned at Whitbache, he has them in charge. He will wait until we come. I will go with you, Brother Cadfael.” He tasted the name delicately if inaccurately, finding it strange on his tongue. He laughed, very softly, surrendering his hand to be led half-blind wherever his guide wished. Thus hand in hand they went out by the cloister, and threaded the maze to the infirmary door.

  In the inner room Brother Elyas lay monumentally asleep, long, splendid and calm, stretched on his back, with lean hands easy on his breast, and face serene and handsome. A tomb-figure carved to flatter and ennoble the dead man beneath, but this man lived and breathed evenly, and the large, rounded lids over his sleeping eyes were placid as a child’s. Brother Elyas gathered within him the grace that healed body and mind, and made no overwheening claim on a guilt beyond his due.

  No need to agonize any more over Brother Elyas. Cadfael closed the door on him, and sat down in the dim anteroom with his guest. They had, perhaps, as much as two hours before midnight and Matins.

  The small room, bare and stony and lit by only one candle, had a secret intimacy about it at this late hour. They were quiet together, the young man and the elder, eyeing each other with open and amiable curiosity. Long silences did not disturb them, and when they spoke their voices were low, reflective and at peace. They might have known each other life long. Life long? The one of them could surely be no more than five or six and twenty, and a stranger from a strange land.

  “You may have a hazardous journey yet,” said Cadfael. “In your shoes I would leave the highways after Leominster, and avoid Hereford.” He grew enthusiastic, and went into some detail about the route to be preferred, even drawing a plan of the ways as he remembered them, with a charcoal stick on the stones of the floor. The boy leaned and peered, all willing attention, and looked up into Cadfael’s face at close quarters with a mettlesome lift of the head and a swift, brilliant smile. Everything about him was stirring and strange, and yet from time to time Cadfael caught his breath as at a fleeting glimpse of something familiar, but so long past that the illusion was gone before he could grasp it, and search back in his memory for the place and the time where it belonged.

  “All this you are doing in pure goodwill,” said Olivier, his smile at once challenging and amused, “and you know nothing of me!
How can you be sure I am fit to be trusted with this errand, and take no advantage for my lord and my empress?”

  “Ah, but I do know something of you, more than you may think. I know that you are called Olivier de Bretagne, and that you came with Laurence d’Angers from Tripoli. I know that you have been in his service six years, and are his most trusted squire. I know that you were born in Syria, of a Syrian mother and a Frankish knight, and that you made your way to Jerusalem to join your father’s people and your father’s faith.” And I know more, he thought, recalling the girl’s rapt face and devout voice as she praised her paladin. I know that Ermina Hugonin, who is well worth winning, has set her heart on you, and will not easily give up, and by that amber stare of yours, and the blood mounting to your brow, I know that you have set your heart on her, and that you will not undervalue your own worth by comparison with her, or let any other make it a barrier between you, no matter in what obscure way you came into this world. Between the two of you, it would be a bold uncle who would stand in your way.

  “She does indeed trust you!” said Olivier, intent and solemn.

  “So she may, and so may you. You are here on an honorable quest, and have done well in it. I am for you, and for them, sister and brother both. I have seen their mettle and yours.”

  “But for all that,” owned Olivier, relaxing into a rueful smile, “she has somewhat deceived you and herself. For her every Frankish soldier of the Crusade could be nothing less than a noble knight. And the most of them were none, but runaway younger sons, romantic boys from the byre and the field, rogues one leap ahead of the officers for theft or highway robbery or breaking open some church almsbox. No worse than most other men, but no better. Not even every lord with a horse and a lance was another Godfrey of Bouillon or Guimar de Massard. And my father was no knight, but a simple man-at-arms of Robert of Normandy’s forces. And my mother was a poor widow who had a booth in the market of Antioch. And I am their bastard, got between faiths between peoples, a mongrel afterthought before they parted. But for all that, she was beautiful and loving, and he was brave and kind, and I think myself well mothered and fathered, and the equal of any man living. And I shall make that good before Ermina’s kin, and they will acknowledge it and give her to me!” His deep, soft voice had grown urgent, and his hawk-face passionately earnest, and at the end of it he drew breath deep, and smiled. “I do not know why I tell you all this, except that I have seen you care for her, and wish her the future she deserves. I should like you to think well of me.”

  “I am a common man myself,” said Cadfael comfortably, “and have found as good in the kennel as in the court. She is dead, your mother?”

  “Else I would not have left her. I was fourteen years old when she died.”

  “And your father?”

  “I never knew him, nor he me. He sailed for England from St. Symeon after their last meeting, and never knew he had left her a son. They had been lovers long before, when he came fresh to Syria. She never would tell me his name, though often she praised him. There cannot be much amiss,” said Olivier thoughtfully, “with a mating that left her such fondness and pride.”

  “Half mankind matches without ritual blessing,” said Cadfael, surprised at the stirring of his own thoughts. “Not necessarily the worse half. At least no money passes then, and no lands are prized before the woman.”

  Olivier looked up, suddenly aware of the oddity of these exchanges, and laughed, but softly, not to disturb the sleeper next door. “Brother, these walls are hearing curious confidences, and I am learning how wide is the Benedictine scope. I might well imagine you speak of your own knowledge.”

  “I was in the world forty years,” said Cadfael simply, “before I chose this discipline for my cure. I have been soldier, sailor and sinner. Even crusader! At least that was pure, however the cause fell short of my hopes. I was very young then. I knew both Tripoli and Antioch, once. I knew Jerusalem. They will all have changed now, that was long ago.”

  Long ago, yes—twenty-seven years since he had left those shores!

  The young man grew talkative at finding so knowledgeable a companion. For all his knightly ambitions and his dedication to a new faith, a part of him leaned back with longing to his native land. He began to talk of the royal city, and of old campaigns, to question eagerly of events before ever he was born, and to extol the charm of remembered places.

  “I wonder, though,” admitted Cadfael wryly, recalling how far his own cause had often fallen short, and how often the paynim against whom he had fought had seemed to him the nobler and the braver, “I wonder, born into such a faith, that you should find it easy to leave it, even for a father.” He rose as he spoke, recollecting how time must be passing. “I should be waking them. It cannot be long to the Matins bell.”

  “It was not easy at all,” said Olivier, pondering in some surprise that the same doubt had so seldom troubled him. “I was torn, a long time. It was from my mother I had, as it were, the sign that turned the scale. Given the difference in our tongues, my mother bore the same name as your Lady Mary …”

  Behind Cadfael’s back the door of the little room had opened very softly. He turned his head to see Ermina, flushed and young from sleep, standing in the doorway.

  ” … she was called Mariam,” said Olivier.

  “I have roused Yves,” said Ermina, just above a whisper. “I am ready.”

  Her eyes, huge and clear, all the agonizing of the day washed away by sleep, clung to Olivier’s face, and at the sound of her voice he flung up his head and answered the look as nakedly as if they had embraced heart to heart. Brother Cadfael stood amazed and enlightened. It was not the name the boy had spoken, it was the wild rise of his head, the softened light over his cheek and brow, the unveiled, unguarded blaze of love, turning the proud male face momentarily into a woman’s face, one known and remembered through twenty-seven years of absence.

  Cadfael turned like a man in a dream, and left them together, and went to help a sleepy Yves to dress and make ready for his journey.

  He let them out by the wicket door while the brothers were at Matins. The girl took a grave and dignified leave, and asked his prayers. The boy, still half asleep, lifted his face for the kiss proper between respected elder and departing child, and the young man, in generous innocence and in acknowledgement of a parting probably lifelong, copied the tribute and offered an olive cheek. He did not wonder at Cadfael’s silence, for after all, the night demanded silence and discretion.

  Cadfael did not stand to watch them go, but closed the wicket again, and went back to sit beside Brother Elyas, and let the wonder and the triumph wash over him in wave on wave of exultation. Nunc dimittis! No need to speak, no need to make any claim, or trouble in any way the course Olivier had set himself. What need had he now of that father of his? But I have seen him, rejoiced Cadfael, I have had him by the hand in the darkness, I have sat with him and talked of time past, I have kissed him, I have had cause to be glad of him, and shall have cause to be glad lifelong. There is a marvelous creature in the world with my blood in his veins, and Mariam’s blood, and what does it matter whether these eyes ever see him again? And yet they may, even in this world! Who knows?

  The night passed sweetly over him. He fell asleep where he sat, and dreamed of unimaginable and undeserved mercies until the bell rang for Prime.

  He thought it politic, on reflection, to be the first to discover the defection and raise the mild alarm. There was a search, but the guests were gone, and it was not the business of the brothers to confine or pursue them, and the only anxiety Prior Leonard expressed was for the fugitives themselves, that they might go in safety, and come safely to their proper guardian. Indeed, Prior Leonard received the whole affair with a degree of complacency that Cadfael found faintly suspicious, though it might have been only a reflection of the distracted elation he himself could not quite dissemble. The discovery that Ermina had stripped the rings from her fingers and left them, with the carefully folded habit, on Sist
er Hilaria’s sealed coffin as an offering, absolved the runaways from the charge of ingratitude.

  “But what the deputy sheriff will say is another matter,” sighed Prior Leonard, snaking an apprehensive head.

  Hugh did not present himself until it was time for High Mass, and heard the news with a very appropriate and official show of displeasure, only to shrug it off as of secondary importance, considering the weightier matters he had dealt with successfully.

  “Well, they have saved us an escort, then, and so they get safe to d’Angers, so much the better if it’s at his expense. We have rooted out that lair of wolves, and sent a murderer off this morning towards Shrewsbury, and that was the chief of my business here. And I’m off after my men within the hour, and you may as well ride with me, Cadfael, for I fancy your business here is just as well concluded as mine.”

  Brother Cadfael thought so, too. Elyas had no more need of him, and to linger where those three had been had no more meaning now. At noon he saddled up and took his leave of Leonard and rode with Hugh Beringar for Shrewsbury.

  The sky was veiled but benign, the air cold but still and clear, a good day for going home well content. They had not ridden thus knee to knee in peace and without haste for some time, and the companionship was good, whether in speech or silence.

  “So you got your children away without a hitch,” said Hugh innocently. “I thought it could safely be left to you.”

  Cadfael gave him a measuring and mildly resentful look, and could feel no great surprise.”I should have known! I thought you made and kept yourself very scarce overnight. I suppose it wouldn’t have done for a deputy sheriff with your reputation for sharpness to sleep the night through while his hostages slipped away quietly for Gloucester.” Not to speak of their escort, he thought, but did not say. Hugh had noted the quality of the supposed forester’s son, and even guessed at his purpose, but Hugh did not know his name and lineage. Some day, when wars ended and England became one again, some day Hugh might be told what now Cadfael hugged his heart in secret. But not yet! It was too new a visitation, he could spare none of the miraculous, the astonishing grace. “From Ludlow,” he said, “I grant you could hardly be expected to hear the wicket at Bromfield open and close at midnight. You did not leave Boterel in Dinan’s care, then?”