Ellis Peters - One Corpse Too Many

here, I’ve been keeping an eye open for you every half-hour or so, and at last I have you. Here, sit down and ease your heart, we’ve come through well enough!”

Urgent and low, Torold asked the one thing that mattered:

“Where is Godith?”

Godith, if he had but known it, was at that moment viewing her own reflection in Aline’s glass, which Constance was holding well away from her to capture more of the total image. Washed and combed and arrayed in one of Aline’s gowns, brocaded in brown and gold thread, with a thin gold bandeau of Aline’s round her curls, she turned this way and that to admire herself with delight at being female again, and her face was no longer that of an urchin, but of an austere young gentlewoman aware of her advantages. The soft candlelight only made her more mysterious and strange in her own eyes.

“I wish he could see me like this,” she said wistfully, forgetting that so far she had not mentioned any he except Brother Cadfael, and could not now, even to Aline, reveal anything concerning Torold’s person and errand beyond his name. Concerning herself she had told almost everything, but that was the acknowledgement of a debt.

“There is a he?” asked Aline, sparking with sympathetic curiosity. “And he will escort you? Wherever you are going? No, I mustn’t ask you anything, it would be unfair. But why shouldn’t you wear the dress for him? Once away, you can as well travel as yourself as you can in boy’s clothes.”

“I doubt it,” said Godith ruefully. “Not the way we shall be travelling.”

“Then take it with you. You could put it in that great bundle of yours. I have plenty, and if you are going with nothing, then you’ll need a gown for when you reach safety.”

“Oh, if you knew how you-tempt me! You are kind! But I couldn’t take it. And we shall have weight enough to carry, the first miles. But I do thank you, and I shall never forget.”

She had tried on, for pure pleasure, Constance assisting with relish, every dress Aline had with her, and in every one she had imagined herself confronting Torold, without warning, and studying his astonished and respectful face. And somehow, in spite of not knowing where he was or how he was faring, she had spent a blissful afternoon, unshaken by doubts. Certainly he would see her in her splendour, if not in this in other fine gowns, in jewels, with her hair, grown long again, plaited and coiled upon her head in a gold circlet like this one. Then she recalled how she had sat beside him, the two of them companionably eating plums and committing the stones to the Severn through the floorboards of the mill, and she laughed. What use would it ever be, putting on airs with Torold?

She was in the act of lifting the circlet from her head when they all heard the sudden but circumspect knocking on the outer door, and for a moment froze into wary stillness, looking at one another aghast.

“Do they mean to search here, after all?” wondered Godith in a shocked whisper. “Have I brought you into danger?”

“No! Adam assured me I should not be disturbed, this morning, when they came.” Aline rose resolutely. “You stay here with Constance, and bolt the door. I’ll go. Can it be Brother Cadfael come for you already?”

“No, surely not yet, they’ll still be on the watch.”

It had sounded the most deferential of knocks, but all the same, Godith sat very still behind the bolted door, and listened with strained attention to the snatches of voices that reached her from without. Aline had brought her visitor into the room. The voice that alternated with hers was a man’s, low-pitched and ardently courteous.

“Adam Courcelle!” Constance mouthed silently, and smiled her knowing smile. “So deep in love, he can’t keep away!”

“And she — Aline?” whispered Godith curiously.

“Who knows! Not she — not yet!”

Godith had heard the same voice that morning, addressing the porter and the lay servants at the gate in a very different tone. But such duties can surely give no pleasure, and may well make even a decent man ill-humoured and overbearing. This devout and considerate soul enquiring tenderly after Aline’s peace of mind might be his proper self.

“I hope you have not been too much put out by all this stir,” he was saying. “There’ll be no more disturbances, you may rest now.”

“I haven’t been molested at all,” Aline assured him serenely. “I have no complaint, you have been considerate indeed. But I’m sorry for those who have had goods distrained. Is the same thing happening in the town?”

“It is,” he said ruefully, “and will go on tomorrow, but the abbey may be at peace now. We have finished here.”

“And you did not find her? The girl you had orders to search for?”

“No, we have not found her.”

“What would you say,” asked Aline deliberately, “if I said that I was glad?”

“I should say that I would expect nothing else from you, and I honour you for it. I know you could not wish danger or pain or captivity to any creature, much less a blameless girl. I’ve learned so much of you, Aline.” The brief silence was charged, and when he resumed: “Aline — ” his voice sank so low that Godith could not distinguish the words. She did not want to, the tone was too intimate and urgent. But in a few moments she heard Aline say gently:

“You must not ask me to be very receptive tonight, this has been a harrowing day for so many. I can’t help but feel almost as weary as they must be. And as you! Leave me to sleep long tonight, there will be a better time for talking of these matters.”

“True!” he said, resuming the soldier on duty as though he squared his shoulders to a load again. “Forgive me, this was not the time. Most of my men are out of the gates by now, I’ll follow them, and let you rest. You may hear marching and the carts rolling for a quarter of an hour or so, after that it will be quiet.”

The voices receded, towards the outer door. Godith heard it opened, and after a few exchanged and inaudible words, closed again. She heard the bolt shot, and in a few moments more Aline tapped at the bedroom door. “You can safely open, he’s gone.”

She stood in the doorway, flushed and frowning, rather in private perplexity than displeasure. “It seems,” she said, and smiled in a way Adam Courcelle would have rejoiced to see, “that in sheltering you I’ve done him no wrong. I think he’s relieved at not finding you. They’re all going. It’s over. Now we have only to wait for Brother Cadfael and full darkness.”

In the hut in the herbarium Brother Cadfael fed, reassured and doctored his patient. Torold, once the first question had been answered so satisfactorily, lay down submissively on Godith’s bed, and let his shoulder be dressed again, and the gash in his thigh, already healed, nevertheless be well bandaged and padded. “For if you’re to ride into Wales this night,” said Cadfael, “we don’t want any damage or delays, you could all too easily break that open again.”

“Tonight?” said Torold eagerly. “Is it to be tonight? She and I together?”

“It is, it must, and high time, too. I don’t think I could stand this sort of thing much longer,” said Cadfael, though he sounded almost complacent about it. “Not that I’ve had too much of the pair of you, you understand, but all the same, I’ll be relieved when you’re well away towards Owain Gwynedd’s country, and what’s more, I’ll give you a token from myself to the first Welsh you encounter. Though you already have FitzAlan’s commendation to Owain, and Owain keeps his word.”

“Once mounted and started,” vowed Torold heartily, “I’ll take good care of Godith.”