The Devil's Novice

by Ellis Peters

  Edred, whistling, tethered the horses as he had said he would, and went off to visit his sister and the girl next door.

  *

  Hugh Beringar, not a wedding guest, was nevertheless as early on the scene as were Meriet and Mark, nor did he come alone. Two of his officers loitered unobtrusively among the shifting throng in the great court, where a number of the curious inhabitants of the Foregate had added themselves to the lay servants, boys and novices, and the various birds of passage lodged in the common hall. Cold though it might be, they intended to see all there was to be seen. Hugh kept out of sight in the anteroom of the gatehouse, where he could observe without himself being observed. Here he had within his hand all those who had been closest to the death of Peter Clemence. If this day’s ferment did not cast up anything fresh, then both Leoric and Nigel must be held to account, and made to speak out whatever they knew.

  In compliment to a generous patron of the abbey, Abbot Radulfus himself had elected to conduct the marriage service, and that ensured that his guest Canon Eluard should also attend. Moreover, the sacrament would be at the high altar, not the parish altar, since the abbot was officiating, and the choir monks would all be in their places. That severed Hugh from any possibility of a word in advance with Cadfael. A pity, but they knew each other well enough by now to act in alliance even without prearrangement.

  The leisurely business of assembly had begun already, guests crossed from hall to church by twos and threes, in their best. A country gathering, not a court one, but equally proud and of lineage as old or older. Compassed about with a great cloud of witnesses, equally Saxon and Norman, Roswitha Linde would go to her bridal. Shrewsbury had been given to the great Earl Roger almost as soon as Duke William became king, but many a manor in the outlying countryside had remained with its old lord, and many a come-lately Norman lordling had had the sense to take a Saxon wife, and secure his gains through blood older than his own, and a loyalty not due to himself.

  The interested crowd shifted and murmured, craning to get the best view of the passing guests. There went Leoric Aspley, and there his son Nigel, that splendid young man, decked out to show him at his best, and Janyn Linde in airy attendance, his amused and indulgent smile appropriate enough in a good-natured bachelor assisting at another young man’s loss of liberty. That meant that all the guests should now be in their places. The two young men halted at the door of the church and took their stand there.

  Roswitha came from the guest-hall swathed in her fine blue cloak, for her gown was light for a winter morning. No question but she was beautiful, Hugh thought, watching her sail down the stone steps on Wulfric’s plump, complacent arm. Cadfael had reported her as quite unable to resist drawing all men after her, even elderly monks of no attraction or presence. She had the audience of her life now, lined up on either side of her unhurried passage to the church, gaping in admiration. And in her it seemed as innocent and foolish as an over-fondness for honey. To be jealous of her would be absurd.

  Isouda Foriet, demure in eclipse behind such radiance, walked after the bride, bearing her gilded prayer-book and ready to attend on her at the church door, where Wulfric lifted his daughter’s hand from his own arm, and laid it in the eager hand Nigel extended to receive it. Bride and groom entered the church porch together, and there Isouda lifted the warm mantle from Roswitha’s shoulders and folded it over her own arm, and so followed the bridal pair into the dim nave of the church.

  Not at the parish altar of Holy Cross, but at the high altar of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, Nigel Aspley and Roswitha Linde were made man and wife.

  *

  Nigel made his triumphal way from the church by the great west door which lay just outside the enclave of the abbey, close beside the gatehouse. He had Roswitha ceremoniously by the hand, and was so blind and drunk with his own pride of possession that it was doubtful if he was aware even of Isouda herself standing in the porch, let alone of the cloak she spread in her hands and draped over Roswitha’s shoulders, as bride and groom reached the chill brightness of the frosty noon outside. After them streamed the proud fathers and gratified guests; and if Leone’s face was unwontedly grey and sombre for such an occasion, no one seemed to remark it; he was at all times an austere man.

  Nor did Roswitha notice the slight extra weight on her left shoulder of an ornament intended for a man’s wear. Her eyes were fixed only on the admiring crowd that heaved and sighed with approbation at sight of her. Here outside the wall the throng had grown, since everyone who had business or a dwelling along the Foregate had come to stare. Not here, thought Isouda, following watchfully, not here will there be any response, here all those who might recognise the brooch are walking behind her, and Nigel is as oblivious as she. Only when they turn in again at the gatehouse, having shown themselves from the parish door, will there be anyone to take heed. And if Canon Eluard fails me, she thought resolutely, then I shall speak out, my word against hers or any man’s.

  Roswitha was in no hurry; her progress down the steps, across the cobbles of the forecourt to the gateway and so within to the great court, was slow and stately, so that every man might stare his fill. That was a blessed chance, for in the meantime Abbot Radulfus and Canon Eluard had left the church by transept and cloister, and stood to watch benevolently by the stair to the guesthall, and the choir monks had followed them out to disperse and mingle with the fringes of the crowd, aloof but interested.

  Brother Cadfael made his way unobtrusively to a post close to where the abbot and his guest stood, so that he could view the advancing pair as they did. Against the heavy blue cloth of Roswitha’s cloak the great brooch, aggressively male, stood out brilliantly. Canon Eluard had broken off short in the middle of some quiet remark in the abbot’s ear, and his beneficent smile faded, and gave place to a considering and intent frown, as though at this slight distance his vision failed to convince him he was seeing what indeed he saw.

  “But that…” he murmured, to himself rather than to any other. “But no, how can it be?”

  Bride and groom drew close, and made dutiful reverence to the dignitaries of the church. Behind them came Isouda, Leoric, Wulfric, and all the assembly of their guests. Under the arch of the gatehouse Cadfael saw Janyn’s fair head and flashing blue eyes, as he loitered to exchange a word with someone in the Foregate crowd known to him, and then came on with his light, springing step, smiling.

  Nigel was handing his wife to the first step of the stone stairway when Canon Eluard stepped forward and stood between, with an arresting motion of his hand. Only then, following his fixed gaze, did Roswitha look down at the collar of her cloak, which swung loose on her shoulders, and see the glitter of enamelled colours and the thin gold outlines of fabulous beasts, entwined with sinuous leaves.

  “Child,” said Eluard, “may I look more closely?” He touched the raised threads of gold, and the silver head of the pin. She watched in wary silence, startled and uneasy, but not yet defensive or afraid. “That is a beautiful and rare thing you have there,” said the canon, eyeing her with a slight, uncertain frown. “Where did you get it?”

  Hugh had come forth from the gatehouse and was watching and listening from the rear of the crowd. At the corner of the cloister two habited brothers watched from a distance. Pinned here between the watchers round the west door and the gathering now halted inexplicably here in the great court, and unwilling to be noticed by either, Meriet stood stiff and motionless in shadow, with Brother Mark beside him, and waited to return unseen to his prison and refuge.

  Roswitha moistened her lips, and said with a pale smile: “It was a gift to me from a kinsman.”

  “Strange!” said Eluard, and turned to the abbot with a grave face. “My lord abbot, I know this brooch well, too well ever to mistake it. It belonged to the bishop of Winchester, and he gave it to Peter Clemence—to that favoured clerk of his household whose remains now lie in your chapel.”

  Brother Cadfael had already noted one remarkable circumstance. He had been watc
hing Nigel’s face ever since that young man had first looked down at the adornment that was causing so much interest, and until this moment there had been no sign whatever that the brooch meant anything to him. He was glancing from Canon Eluard to Roswitha, and back again, a puzzled frown furrowing his broad forehead and a faint, questioning smile on his lips, waiting for someone to enlighten him. But now that its owner had been named, it suddenly had meaning for him, and a grim and frightening meaning at that. He paled and stiffened, staring at the canon, but though his throat and lips worked, either he found no words or thought better of those that he had found, for he remained mute. Abbot Radulfus had drawn close on one side, and Hugh Beringar on the other.

  “What is this? You recognise this gem as belonging to Master Clemence? You are certain?”

  “As certain as I was of those possessions of his which you have already shown me, cross and ring and dagger, which had gone through the fire with him. This he valued in particular as the bishop’s gift. Whether he was wearing it on his last journey I cannot say, but it was his habit, for he prized it.”

  “If I may speak, my lord,” said Isouda clearly from behind Roswitha’s shoulder, “I do know that he was wearing it when he came to Aspley. The brooch was in his cloak when I took it from him at the door and carried it to the chamber prepared for him, and it was in his cloak also when I brought it out to him the next morning when he left us. He did not need the cloak for riding, the morning was warm and fine. He had it slung over his saddle-bow when he rode away.”

  “In full view, then,” said Hugh sharply. For cross and ring had been left with the dead man and gone to the fire with him. Either time had been short and flight imperative, or else some superstitious awe had deterred the murderer from stripping a priest’s gems of office from his very body, though he had not scrupled to remove this one fine thing which lay open to his hand. “You observe, my lords,” said Hugh, “that this jewel seems to show no marks of damage. If you will allow us to handle and examine it…?”

  Good, thought Cadfael, reassured, I should have known Hugh would need no nudging from me. I can leave all to him now.

  Roswitha made no move either to allow or prevent, as Hugh unpinned the great brooch from its place. She looked on with a blanched and apprehensive face, but said never a word. No, Roswitha was not entirely innocent in the matter; whether she had known what this gift was and how come by or not, she had certainly understood that it was perilous and not to be shown—not yet! Perhaps not here? And after their marriage they were bound for Nigel’s northern manor. Who was likely to know it there?

  This has never seen the fire,” said Hugh, and handed it to Canon Eluard for confirmation. “Everything else the man had was burned with him. Only this one thing was taken from him before ever those reached him who built him into his pyre. And only one person, last to see him alive, first to see him dead, can have taken this from his cloak as he lay, and that was his murderer.” He turned to Roswitha, who stood pale to translucency, like a woman of ice, staring at him with wide and horrified eyes.

  “Who gave it to you?”

  She cast one rapid glance around her, and then as suddenly took heart, and drawing breath deep, she answered loudly and clearly: “Meriet!”

  *

  Cadfael awoke abruptly to the realisation that he possessed knowledge which he had not yet confided to Hugh, and if he waited for the right challenge to this bold declaration from other lips he might wait in vain, and lose what had already been gained. For most of those here assembled, there was nothing incredible in this great lie she had just told, nothing even surprising, considering the circumstances of Meriet’s entry into the cloister, and the history of the devil’s novice within these walls. And she had clutched at the brief general hush as encouragement, and was enlarging boldly: “He was always following me with his dog’s eyes. I didn’t want his gifts, but I took it to be kind to him. How could I know where he got it?”

  “When?” demanded Cadfael loudly, as one having authority. “When did he give you this gift?”

  “When?” She looked round, hardly knowing where the question had come from, but hasty and positive in answering it, to hammer home conviction. “It was the day after Master Clemence left Aspley—the day after he was killed—in the afternoon. He came to me in our paddock at Linde. He pressed me so to take it… I did not want to hurt him…” From the tail of his eye Cadfael saw that Meriet had come forth from his shadowy place and drawn a little nearer, and Mark had followed him anxiously though without attempting to restrain him. But the next moment all eyes were drawn to the tall figure of Leoric Aspley, as he came striding and shouldering forward to tower over his son and his son’s new wife.

  “Girl,” cried Leoric, “think what you say! Is it well to lie? I know this cannot be true.” He swung about vehemently, encountering in turn with his grieved, grim eyes abbot and canon and deputy-sheriff. “My lords all, what she says is false. My part in this I will confess, and accept gladly whatever penalty is due from me. For this I know, I brought home my son Meriet, that same day that I brought home the dead body of my guest and kinsman, and having cause, or so I thought, to believe my son the slayer, I laid him under lock and key from that hour, until I had considered, and he had accepted, the fate I decreed for him. From late afternoon of the day Peter Clemence died, all the next day, and until noon of the third, my son Meriet was close prisoner in my house. He never visited this girl. He never gave her this gift, for he never had it in his possession. Nor did he ever lift hand against my guest and his kinsman, now it is shown! God forgive me that ever I credited it!”

  “I am not lying!” shrilled Roswitha, struggling to recover the belief she had felt within her grasp. “A mistake only—I mistook the day! It was the third day he came came…”

  Meriet had drawn very slowly nearer. From deep within his shadowing cowl great eyes stared, examining in wonder and anguish his father, his adored brother and his first love, so frantically busy twisting knives in him. Roswitha’s roving, pleading eyes met his, and she fell mute like a songbird shot down in flight, and shrank into Nigel’s circling arms with a wail of despair.

  Meriet stood motionless for a long moment, then he turned on his heel and limped rapidly away. The motion of his lame foot was as if at every step he shook off dust.

  “Who gave it to you?” asked Hugh, with pointed and relentless patience.

  All the crowd had drawn in close, watching and listening, they had not failed to follow the logic of what had passed. A hundred pairs of eyes settled gradually and remorselessly upon Nigel. He knew it, and so did she.

  “No, no, no!” she cried, turning to wind her arms fiercely about her husband. “It was not my lord—not Nigel! It was my brother gave me the brooch!”

  *

  On the instant everyone present was gazing round in haste, searching the court for the fair head, the blue eyes and light-hearted smile, and Hugh’s officers were burrowing through the press and bursting out at the gate to no purpose. For Janyn Linde had vanished silently and circumspectly, probably by cool and unhurried paces from the moment Canon Eluard first noticed the bright enamels on Roswitha’s shoulder. And so had Isouda’s riding-horse, the better of the two hitched outside the gatehouse for Meriet’s use. The porter had paid no attention to a young man sauntering innocently out and mounting without haste. It was a youngster of the Foregate, bright-eyed and knowing, who informed the sergeants that a young gentleman had left by the gate, as long as a quarter of an hour earlier, unhitched his horse, and ridden off along the Foregate, not towards the town. Modestly enough to start with said the shrewd urchin, but he was into a good gallop by the time he reached the corner at the horse-fair and vanished.

  From the chaos within the great court, which must be left to sort itself out without his aid, Hugh flew to the stables, to mount himself and the officers he had with him, send for more men, and pursue the fugitive; if such a word might properly be applied to so gay and competent a malefactor as Janyn.

>   “But why, in God’s name, why?” groaned Hugh, tightening girths in the stable-yard, and appealing to Brother Cadfael, busy at the same task beside him. “Why should he kill? What can he have had against the man? He had never so much as seen him, he was not at Aspley that night. How in the devil’s name did he even know the looks of the man he was waiting for?

  “Someone had pictured him for him—and he knew the time of his departure and the road he would take, that’s plain.” But all the rest was still obscure, to Cadfael as to Hugh.

  Janyn was gone, he had plucked himself gently out of the law’s reach in excellent time, foreseeing that all must come out. By fleeing he had owned to his act, but the act itself remained inexplicable.

  “Not the man,” fretted Cadfael to himself, puffing after Hugh as he led his saddled horse at a trot up to the court and the gatehouse. “Not the man, then it must have been his errand, after all. What else is there? But why should anyone wish to prevent him from completing his well-intentioned ride to Chester, on the bishop’s business? What harm could there be to any man in that?”

  The wedding party had scattered indecisively about the court, the involved families taking refuge in the guest-hall, their closest friends loyally following them out of sight, where wounds could be dressed and quarrels reconciled without witnesses from the common herd. More distant guests took counsel, and some withdrew discreetly, preferring to be at home. The inhabitants of the Foregate, pleased and entertained and passing dubiously reliable information hither and yon and adding to it as it passed, continued attentive about the gatehouse.

  Hugh had his men mustered and his foot in the stirrup when the furious pounding of galloping hooves, rarely heard in the Foregate, came echoing madly along the enclave wall, and clashed in over the cobbles of the gateway. An exhausted rider, sweating on a lathered horse, reined to a slithering, screaming stop on the frosty stones, and fell rather than dismounted into Hugh’s arms, his knees giving under him. All those left in the court, Abbot Radulfus and Prior Robert among them, came closing in haste about the newcomer, foreseeing desperate news.