Alys Clare - Heart of Ice

Tiphaine felt herself sag with disappointment.

Lora said evenly, ‘Will you tell us why not?’

‘Yes. For one thing, there is no guarantee that this Eye of Jerusalem is the power object they claim it to be. What, then, if I take Meggie to Hawkenlye only to have her fall sick with a fatal illness which I cannot cure? I will not take the risk of losing my child!’ The last words were spoken in a very quiet whisper but their force still reached the child sitting on the platform, who gave a little whimper.

‘What if we brought the Eye and the water out to the forest?’ Tiphaine suggested. ‘Would you agree to let the child wield the stone far away from any danger of infection?’

‘I-’ Joanna frowned, as if she had to think hard to find an acceptable way of rejecting this most reasonable request. Then, apparently deciding that nothing but the truth would do before Lora, who would know if she lied, she said, ‘It’s Josse. You, Tiphaine, have just told me that he does not know about Meggie. I have made my life without him; he, presumably, manages quite well without me.’ She glanced up at her beautiful child and her expression softened. ‘And he cannot miss that little person if he is not aware of her existence. No,’ she said, more firmly. ‘I will not undo all that I have achieved over the past two years. I am sorry, but that is my final answer.’

Tiphaine was about to plead, to describe the suffering of the sick and see if that would melt Joanna’s resolve, but Lora gave her a dig in the ribs and she shut her mouth.

Lora said calmly, ‘Very well, Joanna. Thank you for agreeing to speak to us; we shall leave you to your solitude now.’

‘I-’ Whatever Joanna was about to say, she changed her mind. ‘Farewell, Lora, Tiphaine.’

As the two older women passed her by and left the hut, she gave them both a curt bow and then closed the door behind them.

‘Could we not have tried to persuade her?’ Tiphaine said crossly as they hurried away along the winding forest tracks. ‘People are dying, Lora, and she could help!’

‘It is Joanna’s decision,’ Lora said firmly, ‘and that’s an end to it.’

Watching her face, Tiphaine wondered why, when she seemed to be resigned to failure, Lora should look quite cheerful about it. .

Back at Hawkenlye that evening, Josse and Augustus were the first to return. Josse went straight to the Abbess to report that they did not find Sabin de Retz at Robertsbridge but that he and Gus both had the distinct impression that the monk to whom they spoke was eager to see the back of them.

‘The Cistercians are renowned for their love of solitude,’ the Abbess remarked. ‘Could this monk’s demeanour have been simply the desire of a man who has become accustomed to his own company to be free of outsiders?’

‘Perhaps,’ Josse agreed. ‘Only Gussie pointed out that Stephen — that was the monk’s name — excusing himself by saying he had to get back to work was odd since the White Monks have lay brothers for the hard labour.’

‘There is work in a monastery apart from tilling the fields and digging,’ the Abbess said, indicating her heavily loaded table. ‘Possibly this Stephen was behind in his accounts?’

Josse sighed heavily; he was far too tired to rack his brains to find the words to explain the subtle sense that both he and Gus had felt that Stephen was being economical with the truth. ‘No doubt you are right, my lady,’ he said, rather more tetchily than he had intended; the Abbess, he noticed, gave a faint smile. ‘But what of matters here?’ he asked, hastening to change the subject. ‘How fare the infirmarer’s patients in the Vale?’

Now it was the Abbess who sighed. Putting her hands up to rub at her eyes, she said, ‘More sick people arrived this morning; five very ill and three with fever but sufficiently well to help their relatives. Two are dying; for another two there is little hope. And a man came stumbling into the Vale not long ago; he is a thatcher and lives in a hamlet under the eaves of the forest some five miles from here. He is sick but ignores his own symptoms out of anxiety for his twelve-year old son; that boy too, according to Sister Euphemia, will be lucky to see the morning.’

‘I see.’ Josse’s faint optimism that there would be no more new cases said a brief farewell and melted away. ‘How is Sister Judith?’

‘She is holding on.’

Josse hesitated. ‘Brother Firmin?’

The Abbess closed her eyes, as if in a brief prayer. ‘He, too, is still with us.’

Observing her face, Josse said gently, ‘There is still hope, my lady.’

‘Hope for what?’ she snapped back. ‘Nearly a dozen dead and the accommodation in the Vale filled to overflowing with feverish, pain-racked, vomiting people who void their bowels as fast as the nursing nuns and monks can pour the liquid into them! It is a nightmare down there, Sir Josse; a vision of hell, complete with sounds, stenches and suffering that must be making the devil dance with glee!’

She paused, panting, and he waited. Then, calming herself, she said more quietly, ‘I am sorry. You know these things as well as I do and I should not have shouted at you.’

‘Shout away, my lady, if it helps,’ he said kindly.

She was looking at him with an odd expression in her eyes, and he remembered how strange she had seemed before he had left to go to Robertsbridge. Puzzled, he was about to ask her outright what was the matter when she spoke; her words serving only to increase his mystification, she said, ‘Oh, Sir Josse, do not be generous with me; I do not deserve it.’

‘My lady, I-’

But she was not going to allow him to speak. Standing up, she said, ‘I must seek out Sister Tiphaine, for there is a matter I wish to discuss with her. Sir Josse, I will not keep you any longer from your well-earned rest; off you go to the Vale where, I am quite sure, Brother Saul will be able to find you something hot to eat.’

Reckoning that he had rarely received such a clear dismissal, Josse opened the door for her and stood back to allow her to precede him out into the cloister. He watched her stride away in the direction of the herbalist’s hut, then spun round and hurried away to the rear gate of the Abbey and the path down to the Vale.

I would do anything in my power to help you, you stubborn woman, he thought angrily. But if you prefer to keep me shut out, then you render me helpless and I am happy to leave you to it.

But as his anger faded he knew that happy was completely the wrong word.

Helewise had no idea whether in fact Sister Tiphaine had yet returned from the forest; she had used a visit to the herbalist as an excuse to see Josse on his way. As the hours had passed she had been feeling increasingly guilty about the events she had set in motion and having him standing right in front of her being kind to her had been more than she could bear.

She hastened past the Great West Door of the Abbey church, hurried on by the sinister, windowless walls of the leper house and turned right along the far perimeter of the Abbey, pacing along the path to the herbalist’s garden and hut.

There was a light showing under the hut’s closed door; it looked as if Sister Tiphaine were back. Opening the door, Helewise stepped into the warm, scented air of the little room and immediately Sister Tiphaine bent in a low reverence.

‘My lady Abbess, I would have come to find you straight away following my return,’ she said after the customary exchange of greetings, ‘but I saw Sir Josse approaching your room and deemed it best not to see you when he was in your presence.’

‘Quite right, Sister.’ Trying to keep the eagerness out of her voice, she said, ‘Now, what news?’

Sister Tiphaine’s very expression seemed to speak of her failure; straight away she said, ‘It’s no good, I’m afraid, my lady; she won’t agree to it.’