Ellis Peters - The Pilgrim of Hate

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!

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.