Ellis Peters - The Sanctuary Sparrow

“I think he came down after her to the brink, showed her the coin, and demanded a share in her gains to pay for his silence. I think he, of all people, had worst underestimated her. A mere woman! He expected prevarication, lies, delay, perhaps pleading, some labour to convince her he knew what he knew and meant what he said. He had greatly mistaken her. He had not bargained for a woman who could accept danger instantly, with no outcry, make up her mind, and act, stamping out the threat as soon as it arose. I think she spoke him fair while she went on laying out the washing, and as he stood by the water’s edge with the coin in his hand she so arranged that she passed behind him with a stone in her hand, reaching to a corner of linen, and struck him down.”

“Go on,” said Hugh, “you cannot leave it there. There was more done than that.”

“I think you already know. Whether the blow quite stunned him or not, it flung him face-down into the shallow water. I think she did not wait to give him time to recover his wits and try to rise, but went on acting instantly. Her skirt and shoes were wet! I have only just learned it. And remember the bruises on his back. I think she stepped upon him in the water, almost as he fell, and held him down until he was dead.”

Hugh sat silent. It was Liliwin who uttered a small whimper of horror at hearing it, and shook as if the night had turned cold.

“And then considered calmly the possibility that the river might find force enough to float him away, and took steps to pin him down where he was, under the alders, under the water, until he could be conveyed away by night, to be discovered elsewhere, a drowned man. Do you recall the pitted bruise on his shoulders? There is a jagged stone fallen from the town wall, beside the pebbles there. As for the coin, it was under his body, she did not try to recover it.”

Hugh drew deep breath. “It could be so! But it was not she who followed her father to his shop and struck him down, for she is one person who is vouched for fully, all that time that he was gone, until she went to look for him. And then she cried out at once for help. There was no time at all when she could have struck the blow or made off with the booty. She may have removed it from the well later, she certainly did not put it there. You are arguing, I take it, that there were two who planned this between them?”

“Two are implied. One to strike and steal and hide, the other to retrieve the goods by night and secrete them in a safer place. One to destroy the extortioner as soon as he declared himself, and the other to take away the body and dispose of it by night. Yes, surely two.”

“Then who is the second? Certainly brother and sister who suffered from such parsimonious elders might compound together to get their hands on what was withheld from them, and certainly Daniel was abroad that night and furtive about it. And for all his tale of a married woman’s bed rings likely enough, I have still had an eye on him. Even shallow men can learn to lie.”

“I have not forgotten Daniel. But you may, for of all men living, her brother is the least likely to have had any part in Susanna’s plans.” Cadfael was recalling, as in a storm-flash of illumination, small, unremarkable, unremarked things, Rannilt repeating the words she had overheard, Juliana’s improbable praise of her granddaughter’s excellent housewifery, in preserving her oatmeal crock half-full past Easter, and Susanna’s bitter taunt: “Had you still a place prepared for me? A nunnery, perhaps?” And then the old woman shrieked and fell down…

No, wait! There was more to it, he saw it now. The old woman at the head of the stairs, the only light that of the little lamp she carried, a falling light, pricking Susanna’s form and features into sharpest light and shade, every curve or hollow magnified… Yes! She saw what she saw, she shrieked and clutched her breast, and then fell, letting fall the revealing lamp from her hand. Somehow she had known the half of it, and come forth by night to confront her only, her best antagonist. She, too, must have seen the torn skirt, the stained hem, and made her own connections. And she had still, she had said, a use for those concealed keys of hers before she surrendered them at last. Yes, and the last words she ever spoke: “For all that, I should have liked to hold my great-grandchild…” Words better understood now than when first he had heard them.

“No, now I see! Nothing now could have held her back. The man who compounded with her to steal was no kinsman, nor one they would ever have admitted as kin. They made their plans perforce, those two, to vanish from here together at the first favourable time, and make a life somewhere far away from this town. Her father grudged her a dowry, she has taken it for her herself. Whatever his name may be, this man, we know now what he is. He is her lover. More, he is the man who has got her with child.”

Chapter Twelve

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Friday: night

Hugh was on his feet before the last words were spoken. “If you’re right, after what has happened they won’t wait for a better time. They’ve left it late as it is and so, by God, have I.”

“You’re going there now? I am coming with you.” Cadfael was not quite easy about Rannilt. In all innocence she had spoken out things that meant nothing evil to her, but might uncover much evil to those who listened. Far better to have her away before she could further threaten Susanna’s purposes. And it seemed that the same fear had fallen upon Liliwin, for he scrambled hastily out of the shadows to catch at Hugh’s arm before they could leave the cloister.

“Sir, am I free now? I need not hide here any longer? Then take me with you! I want to fetch my girl away out of that house. I want her with me. How if they take fright at her too much knowledge? How if they do her harm? I’m coming to bring her away, whether or no it’s safe for me!”

Hugh clapped him heartily on the shoulder. “Come, and welcome. Free as a bird, and I’ll ensure my men shall know it and hold you safe enough. Tomorrow the town shall know it, too.”

There were no lights in the Aurifaber house when Hugh’s sergeant hammered at the hall door. The household was already abed, and it took some time to rouse any of the family. No doubt Dame Juliana, by this time, was shrouded and ready for her coffin.

It was Margery who at last came down to enquire quaveringly through the closed door who was without, and what was the matter at this time of night. At Hugh’s order she opened and let them in, herself surprised and vexed that Susanna, who slept downstairs, had not saved her the trouble. But it soon became clear that Susanna was not there to hear any knocking. Her room was empty, the bed undisturbed, the chest that had held her clothes now contained only a few discarded and well-worn garments.

The arrival of the sheriff’s deputy and others, with several officers of the law, very soon brought out all the inhabitants, Walter coming down blear-eyed and suspicious, Daniel hurrying solicitously to his wife’s side, the boy Griffin peering uncertainly from the other side of the yard. A curiously shrunken and unimpressive gathering, without its two dominant members, and every one of these few who remained utterly at a loss, staring about and at one another in consternation, as though somewhere among the shadows of the hall they might still discover Susanna.

“My daughter?” croaked Walter, looking about him helplessly. “But is she not here? She must be… she was here as always, she put out the lights as she always does, the last to her bed. Not an hour since! She cannot be gone!”

But she was gone. And so, as Cadfael found when he took a lantern and slipped away by the outdoor stairs at the rear of the house and into the undercroft, was Iestyn. Iestyn the Welshman, without money or family or standing, who would never for a moment have been considered as fit for his master’s daughter, even now she had ceased to be necessary to the running of his master’s house, and was of no further value.