Ellis Peters - One Corpse Too Many

Cadfael and Hugh Beringar turned homeward together on foot. “An hour’s walking, hardly more,” said Cadfael, “by the way I’ll take you. The path’s too overgrown in parts for the horses, but I know it well, it cuts off the Foregate. We have to cross the brook, well upstream from the mill, and can enter the abbey grounds from the garden side, unnoticed, if you’re willing to wade.”

“I believe,” said Beringar reflectively, but with complete placidity, “you are having a game with me. Do you mean to lose me in the woods, or drown me in the millrace?”

“I doubt if I should succeed at either. No, this will be a most amicable walk together, you’ll see. And well worth it, I trust.”

And curiously, for all each of them knew the other was making use of him, it was indeed a pleasant nocturnal journey they made,, the elderly monk without personal ambitions, and the young man whose ambitions were limitless and daring. Probably Beringar was working hard at the puzzle of why Cadfael had so readily accommodated him, certainly Cadfael was just as busy trying to fathom why Beringar had ever invited him to conspire with him thus; it did not matter, it made the contest more interesting. And which of them was to win, and to get the most out of the tussle, was very much in the balance.

Keeping pace thus on the narrow forest path they were much of a height, though Cadfael was thickset and burly, and Beringar lean and lissome and light of foot. He followed Cadfael’s steps attentively, and the darkness, only faintly alleviated by starlight between the branches, seemed to bother him not at all. And lightly and freely he talked.

“The king intends to move down into Gloucester’s country again, in more strength, hence this drive for men and horses. In a few more days he’ll surely be moving.”

“And you go with him?” Since he was minded to be talkative, why not encourage him? Everything he said would be calculated, of course, but sooner or later even he might make a miscalculation.

“That depends on the king. Will you credit it, Brother Cadfael, the man distrusts me! Though in fact I’d liefer be put in charge of my own command here, where my lands lie. I’ve made myself as assiduous as I dare — to see the same face too constantly might have the worst effect, not to see it in attendance at all would be fatal. A nice question of judgment.”

“I feel,” said Cadfael, “that a man might have considerable confidence in your judgment. Here we are at the brook, do you hear it?” There were stones there by which to cross dryshod, though the water was low and the bed narrowed, and Beringar, having rested his eyes a few moments to assay the distance and the ground, crossed in a nicely balanced leap that served to justify Cadfael’s pronouncement.

“Do you indeed?” resumed the young man, falling in beside him again as they went on. “Have a high opinion of my judgment? Of risks and vantages only? Or, for instance, of men? — And women?”

“I can hardly question your judgment of men,” said Cadfael drily, “since you’ve confided in me. If I doubted, I’d hardly be likely to own it.”

“And of women?” They were moving more freely now through open fields.

“I think they might all be well advised to beware of you. And what else is gossiped about in the king’s court, besides the next campaign? There’s no fresh word of FitzAlan and Adeney being sighted?”

“None, nor will be now,” said Beringar readily. “They had luck, and I’m not sorry. Where they are by now there’s no knowing, but wherever it is, it’s one stage on the way to France.”

There was no reason to doubt him; whatever he was about he was making his dispositions by way of truth, not lies. So the news for Godith’s peace of mind was still good, and every day better, as the distance between her father and Stephen’s vengeance lengthened. And now there were two excellent horses well positioned on an escape road for Godith and Torold, in the care of two stalwart brothers who would release them at Cadfael’s word. The first step was accomplished. Now to recover the saddlebags from the river, and start them on their way. Not so simple a matter, but surely not impossible.

“I see now where we are,” said Beringar, some twenty minutes later. They had cut straight across the mile of land enclosed by the brook’s wanderings, and stood again on the bank; on the other side the stripped fields of pease whitened in the starlight, and beyond their smooth rise lay the gardens, and the great range of abbey buildings. “You have a nose for country, even in the dark. Lead the way, I’ll trust you for an unpitted ford, too.”

Cadfael had only to kilt his habit, having nothing but his sandals to get wet. He strode into the water at the point opposite the low roof of Godith’s hut, which just showed above the trees and bushes and the containing wall of the herbarium. Beringar plunged in after him, boots and hose and ail. The water was barely knee-deep, but clearly he cared not at all. And Cadfael noted how he moved, gently and steadily, hardly a ripple breaking from his steps. He had all the intuitive gifts of wild creatures, as alert by night as by day. On the abbey bank he set off instinctively round the edge of the low stubble of peasehaulms, to avoid any rustle among the dry roots soon to be dug in.

“A natural conspirator,” said Cadfael, thinking aloud; and that he could do so was proof of a strong, if inimical, bond between them.

Beringar turned on him a face suddenly lit by a wild smile. “One knows another,” he said. They had grown used to exchanging soundless whispers, and yet making them clear to be heard. “I’ve remembered one rumour that’s making the rounds, that I forgot to tell you. A few days ago there was some fellow hunted into the river by night, said to be one of FitzAlan’s squires. They say an archer got him behind the left shoulder, maybe through the heart. However it was, he went down, somewhere by Atcham his body may be cast up. But they caught a riderless horse, a good saddle-horse, the next day, sure to be his.”

“Do you tell me?” said Cadfael, mildly marvelling. “You may speak here, there’ll be no one prowling in my herb-garden by night, and they’re used to me rising at odd times to tend my brews here.”

“Does not your boy see to that?” asked Hugh Beringar innocently.

“A boy slipping out of the dortoir,” said Brother Cadfael, “would soon have cause to rue it. We take better care of our children here, my lord, than you seem to think.”

“I’m glad to hear it. It’s well enough for seasoned old soldiers turned monk to risk the chills of the night, but the young things ought to be protected.” His voice was sweet and smooth as honey. “I was telling you of this odd thing about the horses … A couple of days later, if you’ll believe it, they rounded up another saddle-horse running loose, grazing up in the heathlands north of the town, still saddled. They’re thinking there was a single bodyguard sent out from the castle, when the assault came, to pick up Adeney’s daughter from wherever she was hidden, and escort her safely out of the ring round Shrewsbury. They think the attempt failed,” he said softly, “when her attendant took to the river to save her. So she’s still missing, and still thought to be somewhere here, close in hiding. And they’ll be looking for her, Brother Cadfael — they’ll be looking for her now more eagerly than ever.”

They were up at the edge of the inner gardens by then. Hugh Beringar breathed an almost silent “Good night!” and was gone like a shadow towards the guest house.

Before he slept out the rest of the night, Brother Cadfael lay awake long enough to do some very hard thinking. And the longer he thought,, the more convinced he became that someone had indeed approached the mill closely enough and silently enough to catch the last few sentences spoken within; and that the someone was Hugh Beringar, past all doubt. He had proved how softly he could move, how instinctively he adapted his movements to circumstances, he had provoked a shared expedition committing each of them to the other’s discretion, and he had uttered a number of cryptic confidences calculated to arouse suspicion and alarm, and possibly precipitate unwise action — though Cadfael had no intention of giving him that last satisfaction. He did not believe the listener had been within earshot long. But the last thing Cadfael himself had said gave away plainly enough that he intended somehow to get hold of two horses, retrieve the hidden treasury, and see Torold on his way with “her.” If Beringar had been at the door just a moment earlier, he must also have heard the girl named; but even without that he must surely have had his suspicions. Then just what game was he playing, with his own best horses, with the fugitives he could betray at any moment, yet had not so far betrayed, and with Brother Cadfael? A better and larger prize offered than merely one young man’s capture, and the exploitation of a girl against whom he had no real grudge. A man like Beringar might prefer to risk all and play for all, Torold, Godith and treasure in one swoop. For himself alone, as once before, though without success? Or for the king’s gain and favour? He was indeed a young man of infinite possibilities.