Ellis Peters - A Morbid Taste For Bones

“Our Annest here brewed it,” said Bened, with tolerant pride in his niece, and clapped a hand fondly on her shoulder. “And only one of her skills! She’ll be a treasure for some man when she weds, but a sad loss to me.”

“I might bring you a good smith to work with you,” said the girl, dimpling. “Where’s the loss then?”

It was deep dusk, and with all the longing they felt to linger, they had to be away. Huw was fidgety, thinking of Prior Robert’s rising impatience, his tall figure pacing the garden and looking out for the first glimpse of his messengers returning. “We should be off. We shall be looked for. Come, brother, make your farewells.”

Brother John rose reluctantly but dutifully. The groom was leading the horses forward, an arm under each arching neck. With composed face but glowing eyes Brother John said his general goodnight and blessing. In careful but resounding Welsh!

The echo swept the riders away towards the gate on a wave of laughter and goodwill, in which the girl’s light voice soared gaily, and Engelard’s hearty English “God go with you!” balanced the tongues.

“And who taught you that between evening and dark?” asked Brother Cadfael with interest, as they entered the deep green twilight under the trees. “Bened or Cai?”

“Neither,” said Brother John, contentedly pondering a deep private satisfaction.

Small use asking how she had managed it, she having no English and he no Welsh, to determine what the phrase was she was drumming into him. There was a kind of language at work here that made short shrift on interpreters.

“Well, you can fairly claim the day hasn’t been wasted,” owned Cadfael generously, “if something’s been learned. And have you made any other discoveries to add to that?”

“Yes,” said Brother John, placidly glowing. “The day after tomorrow is baking-day at Bened’s.”

“You may rest and sleep, Father Prior,” said Huw, fronting the tall, pale forehead gallantly with his low, brown one. “Rhisiart has said he will come, and he will listen. He was gracious and reasonable. Tomorrow at noon or soon after he will be here.”

Prior Robert certainly loosed a cautious, suppressed sigh of relief. But he required more before they could all go away and sleep. Richard loomed at his shoulder, large, benign and anxious.

“And is he sensible of the wrong-mindedness of his resistance? Will he withdraw his opposition?”

In the dimness where the candle-light barely reached, Brothers Jerome and Columbanus trembled and hoped, for while doubt remained they had not been permitted to remove to their rest at Cadwallon’s house. Anxious eyes appealed, reflecting the light.

Father Huw hedged, wanting his own sleep. “He offers friendly interest and faithful consideration. I asked no more.”

Brother Cadfael said bluntly: “You will need to be persuasive, and sincere. He is sincere. I am no way convinced that he can be lightly persuaded.” He was tired of nursing wounded vanities, he spoke out what was in his mind. “Father Prior, you made your mistake with him this morning. You will need a change of heart, his or yours, to undo that damage.”

Prior Robert made his dispositions as soon as Mass was over next morning, and with some care.

“Only Brother Sub-Prior and I, with Father Huw, and Brother Cadfael as interpreter, will sit at table together. You, Brother John, will make yourself useful to the cooks, and do whatever is needed, and you may also see to Father Huw’s cattle and chickens. And you two, Brother Jerome, Brother Columbanus, I have a special mission for you. Since we are about Saint Winifred’s business, I would have you go and spend the hours while we deliberate in vigil and prayer, imploring her aid to bring the obdurate to reason, and our errand to a successful conclusion. Not in the church here, but in her own chapel in the old graveyard where she is buried. Take your food and your measure of wine with you, and go there now. The boy Edwin will show you the way. If we prevail upon Rhisiart, as with her aid I trust we may, I will send to release you. But continue your intercessions until I do send word.”

They scattered dutifully, John, cheerfully enough, to tend the fire for Marared, and fetch and carry as she directed. The old woman, long widowed and her own sons grown, preened herself at having a strapping young fellow to keep her company, and Cadfael reflected that John might well be favoured with the best bits before the meal ever came to table. As for Jerome and Columbanus, he saw them set out with the boy, bread and meat wrapped in napkins in the breasts of their habits, and Columbanus carrying the flask with their ration of wine, and a small bottle of spring water for himself.

“It is very little to offer,” he said meekly, “but I will touch nothing but water until our cause has prevailed.”

“More fool he,” said Brother John blithely, “for he may well be swearing off wine for life!”

It was a fine spring morning, but capricious as May can be. Prior Robert and his attendants sat in the orchard until they were driven indoors by a sharp and sparkling shower that lasted almost half an hour. It was then approaching noon, the time when Rhisiart should join them. He would have a wet walk by the short path through the forest. Or perhaps he had waited for the sun’s return at Cadwallon’s house, which was on his way. Making allowances for that, they thought little of it when another half-hour passed, and he did not put in an appearance. But when he was an hour late for the meeting, and still no sign of him, Prior Robert’s face grew both grim and cautiously triumphant.

“He has heard the warning I issued against his sin, and he fears to come and face me,” he said.

“He had heard the warning, indeed,” said Father Huw heavily, “but I saw no signs of fear in him. He spoke very firmly and calmly. And he is a man of his word. I don’t understand this, it is not like him.”

“We will eat, but frugally,” said the prior, “and give him every chance of keeping his promise, if something has happened to delay him. So it may, to any man. We will wait until it is time to prepare for Vespers.”

“I’ll walk as far as Cadwallon’s house,” offered Brother Richard, “for the way is all one to that point, and see if I can meet with him, or get word if he’s on his way.”

He was gone more than an hour and a half, and came back alone. “I went beyond, some way along the ride, but saw no sign of him. On my way back I asked at Cadwallon’s gate, but no one had seen him pass. I feared he might have walked by the short path while I was taking the other road.”

“We’ll wait for him until Vespers, and no longer,” said the prior, and by then his voice was growing grimly confident, for now he did not expect the guest to come, and the enemy would have put himself in the wrong, to Prior Robert’s great gain. Until Vespers, therefore, they waited, five hours after the appointed time. The people of Gwytherin could hardly say Rhisiart had been written off too hastily.

“So it ends,” said the prior, rising and shaking out his skirts like one shaking off a doubt or an incubus. “He has turned tail, and his opposition will carry no weight now with any man. Let us go!”

The sunlight was still bright but slanting over the green bowl where the church stood, and a number of people were gathering for the service. And out of the deeper green shadow where the forest path began, came, not Rhisiart, but his daughter, sailing gallantly out into the sunlight in a green gown, with her wild hair tamed and braided, and a linen coif over it, Sioned in her church-going person, with Peredur on her heels, his hand possessively cupping her elbow, though she paid little heed to that attention. She saw them issuing in a silent procession from Huw’s gate, and her eyes went from person to person, lingering on Cadfael who came last, and again looking back with a small frown, as though one face was missing from the expected company.