Candace Robb: The Nun's Tale

Though it was beyond mid-morning on a sunny day, the light was dim inside Longford’s house. Louth heard the woman, alternately weeping and whispering, before he made out her form in the shadowy corner. He could not understand what she said. As his eyes grew accustomed to the dark, he noted that the windows across the room from the apparition were still shuttered. He motioned for his squire to open them. The apparition threw up a slender hand to protect her eyes from the light. A decidedly physical gesture, Louth thought. He doubted that a spirit’s eyes would be sensitive to light.

Louth crept up to within a few feet of the blue-draped figure, so close that he could reach out and touch her head. He could see little more than a light-blue mantle or shawl, stained and torn, wrapped about a slender form. The hand held up to the face was dirty. The figure had a strong, mouldy scent, but it was the odour of unwashed flesh and clothing, not decay. So, Louth reasoned, neither a spirit nor a corpse.

‘Who are you, Mistress?’ He spoke in a gentle tone, but loudly enough to be heard over her whispering.

She pounded her chest thrice and murmured, ‘Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa,’ then sobbed and crumpled to the floor. Louth did not know what to make of it. He was relieved when Ravenser slipped quietly in the front door and joined him. The provost crouched by the inert figure, sniffed, rose quickly, putting a handkerchief to his nose. ‘Who is she?’ he whispered.

Louth shrugged. ‘I know not. But she is a fleshly apparition, I think.’ He knelt down and gently pulled the mantle back, uncovering greasy, matted hair. The woman seemed unconscious. Louth cautiously turned her over and touched the delicate, tear-stained face. ‘Come, Maddy,’ Louth called softly. ‘She is warm to the touch, a living being. Tell us if this is Dame Joanna.’

Maddy tiptoed forward, a hand stretched out in front as if to protect herself from a sudden attack. When she was still too far away to see the woman’s features in the dim light, she said, ‘She was not so thin as that, Sir.’

‘Come closer. I have touched her and have not suffered.’ Louth reached back to Maddy. ‘Come. Tell us if it is she.’

Maddy crept close, then recoiled.

Louth nodded. ‘It is the smell of unwashed body, unwashed clothes, Maddy, not decay. Come. Look at her face. Is this Dame Joanna?’ The woman lay still, her eyes closed.

Maddy leaned close, then jumped away, nodding. ‘’Tis her.’

‘Are you certain?’

‘As much as I can be. If I saw the colour of her eyes, I should be certain. I have never seen the like. Clear green, if you can imagine.’

Louth sat back on his heels, wondering how to proceed. ‘Is there a fire in the kitchen, Maddy?’

‘Aye, Sir.’

Louth’s squire, John, crouched down beside him. ‘Shall I carry her there?’

Louth nodded.

John scooped up the woman and stood. Maddy hurried before him, leading the way to the kitchen. Louth pulled two benches together near the fire and John gently laid down his burden. The woman stirred, eyelids fluttering.

‘Some brandywine, Maddy!’ Louth called.

The serving girl brought a cup. As Louth lifted the woman’s head, he noted that her hair was pale red. He was more and more confident that this was Dame Joanna. He put the cup to the woman’s mouth and whispered, ‘Drink slowly.’ Some of the wine spilled down her chin. A hand fluttered up to the cup, touched it. The lips parted. She drank, then coughed. Louth helped her sit up. Her eyes opened, but did not focus. Clear green eyes stared out into the distance.

Maddy nodded. ‘You see the eyes. ’Tis her.’

Louth held the cup to Dame Joanna’s lips and she drank again, then pushed it away. ‘Can you understand me, Dame Joanna?’ The green eyes glanced at Louth with no expression. He was uncertain whether she even saw him. ‘You are in Will Longford’s house in Beverley. Can you tell us what happened to you?’

The pale brows came together in a frown. Then the eyes cleared and focused on his. She grabbed his shoulder. ‘The milk of the Virgin. Is it here?’

‘It is close by.’

‘I must return it.’

‘You must return it to St Clement’s?’ Louth asked.

‘I wear Our Lady’s mantle, you see.’ She clutched the blue shawl to her. ‘I have risen from the dead — as did Our Lady. But it should not have happened so. I am a Magdalene. Our Lady said I must return to die.’

‘Our Lady told you that?’

The eyes opened wide, guileless, innocent. ‘The Blessed Virgin Mary is watching over me.’

Louth glanced at the provost, back to the nun. ‘You had a vision?’

The eyes filled with tears, the head drooped backward against Louth’s arm. ‘I must return,’ she whimpered, her eyes fluttering shut.

‘Dame Joanna?’ Louth whispered.

Joanna muttered something incoherent.

Louth lay her back down on the benches, looked up at Ravenser. ‘What do you think?’

Ravenser frowned down at the nun, pursed his lips, shook his head. ‘I do not like such things — Our Lady’s mantle. . Rising from the dead. .’

They both gazed down at the woman, dirty, ravaged by hunger.

‘She is lovely, even in this condition,’ Louth said with a sigh.

Ravenser glanced up, surprised by the comment. ‘A peculiar thing to be thinking.’

Louth shrugged. ‘She touches something in me. Her delicacy. Her desperation.’ He shook himself and stood up straight.

‘We shall take her to Nunburton Abbey,’ Ravenser said. ‘There she can be tended and watched.’

Maddy looked from one to the other. ‘She is truly alive?’

Ravenser smiled. ‘Yes, Maddy, truly alive. Now tell me, did you actually see her dead?’

Maddy thought, shook her head.

‘But you prepared her for burial?’

‘No. I was at market. I came back and she was wrapped in a shroud.’

Ravenser glanced at Louth, then back to Maddy. ‘Dame Joanna died while you were out?’

Maddy stared down at her feet, tears welling in her eyes. ‘It was so sad. I wouldn’t’ve gone if I’d seen she was worsening.’

Louth did not like this new information. ‘You thought she was improving?’

Maddy nodded. ‘She’d been up and dining with them.’

‘Longford and Jaro?’

Maddy nodded. ‘And their two visitors.’

Visitors. All this time Maddy had mentioned only Will Longford and his man Jaro. But then Louth had been interested only in Longford. ‘I will send for you tomorrow, Maddy. You must tell me everything you remember about Dame Joanna’s days in this house.’

‘But who’s to watch the house while I’m gone, Sir?’

‘I will set a watch, Maddy. I am more anxious than ever to find your master.’

Richard de Ravenser left Dame Joanna, still in a faint, in the competent hands of his housekeeper and rode out to the Abbey of Nunburton. The abbess returned with him and took charge of Joanna. It occurred to Ravenser as he watched the litter and escort depart that he should write to his uncle, the archbishop, who had shown an interest in the nun’s story last summer. But what could Ravenser report? Perhaps he should wait until he and Louth had talked to Maddy again.

Maddy did not like being alone in the house. She had heard Dame Joanna say she had risen from the dead, no matter that Sir Nicholas said it was untrue. Maddy knew the stench of the grave — its odour lingered in the rooms. And the way Dame Joanna had wept — that was not a holy vision. More like the dead returning to haunt the living.

Maddy distracted herself with fantasies about John, Sir Nicholas’s squire. So courteous and handsome, so richly dressed. Maddy imagined lying in John’s arms, close to his heart, as Dame Joanna had. John had shown such tender concern for Joanna, cradling her gently in his arms. Oh, that it had been Maddy! She went to market for a blue mantle, found a large shawl that sufficed. Back at the house, she draped the blue shawl round her and danced about the hall. In her imagination John came in, found her a breathtaking vision. He scooped her up in his arms and carried her up to the master’s bedchamber.