An Excellent Mystery (17 page)

To
none of which could he get a direct answer, since there was none to give him.
Last, as they passed the low hillock of Saint Giles, with its squat roofs and
modest little turret, he said reflectively: “That must have been a hard journey
for a sick and ageing man, all this way from Hyde alone. I marvel how the lord
Godfrid bore it.”

“He
was not alone,” said Hugh almost absently. “They were two who came here from
Hyde Mead.”

“As
well,” said Adam, nodding approval, “for they said he was a sorely wounded man.
He might have foundered on the way, without a helper.” And he drew a slow,
cautious breath.

After
that he went in silence, perhaps because of the looming shadow of the abbey
wall on his left, that cut off the afternoon sun with a sharp black
knife-stroke along the dusty road.

They
rode in under the arch of the gatehouse to the usual stir of afternoon,
following the half-hour or so allowed for the younger brothers to play, and the
older ones to sleep after dinner. Now they were rousing and going forth to
their various occupations, to their desks in the scriptorium, or their labours
in the gardens along the Gaye, or at the mill or the hatcheries of the
fishponds. Brother Porter came out from his lodge at sight of Hugh’s gangling
grey horse, observed the attendant officers, and looked with some natural
curiosity at the unknown who rode with them.

“Brother
Humilis? No, you won’t find him in the scriptorium, nor in the dortoir, either.
After Mass this morning he swooned, here crossing the court, and though the
fall did him no great harm, the young one catching him in his arms and bringing
him down gently, it took some time to bring him round afterwards. They’ve
carried him to the infirmary. Brother Cadfael is there with him now.”

“I’m
sorry to hear it,” said Hugh, checking in dismayed concern. “Then I can hardly
trouble him now…” And yet, if this was one more step towards the end which
Cadfael said was inevitable and daily drawing nearer, Hugh could not afford to
delay any enquiry which might shed light on the fate of Julian Cruce. Humilis
himself most urgently desired knowledge.

“Oh,
he’s come to himself now,” said the porter, “and as much his own master — under
God, the master of us all! — as ever he was. He wants to come back to his own
cell in the dortoir, and says he can still fulfil all his duties a while longer
here, but they’ll keep him where he is. He’s in his full wits, and has all his
will. If you have word for him of any import, I would at least go and see if
they’ll let you in to him.”

“They”,
when it came to authority in the infirmary, meant Brother Edmund and Brother
Cadfael, and their judgement would be decisive.

“Wait
here!” said Hugh, making up his mind, and swung down from the saddle to stride
across the court to its northwestern corner, where the infirmary stood
withdrawn into the angle of the precinct wall. The two sergeants also
dismounted, and stood in close and watchful attendance on their charge, though
it seemed that Adam was quite prepared to brazen out whatever there was to be
answered, for he sat his horse stolidly for a few moments, and then lit down
and freely surrendered his bridle to the groom who had come to see to Hugh’s
mount. They waited in silence, while Adam looked about the clustered buildings
round the court with wary interest.

Hugh
encountered Brother Edmund just emerging from the doorway of the infirmary, and
put his question to him briskly. “I hear you have Brother Humilis within. Is he
fit to have visitors? I have the one missing man here under guard, with luck we
may start something out of him between us, before he has too much time to think
out his cover and make it impregnable.”

Edmund
blinked at him for a moment, hard put to it to leave his own preoccupations for
another man’s. Then he said, after some hesitation: “He grows daily feebler,
but he’s resting well now, and he has been fretting over this matter of the
girl, feeling his own acts brought her to this. His mind is strong and
determined. I think he would certainly wish to see you. Cadfael is there with
him — his wound broke again when he fell, where it was newly healed, but it’s
clean. Yes, go in to him.” His face said, though his lips did not utter it:
“Who knows how long his time may be? An easy mind could lengthen it.”

Hugh
went back to his men. “Come, we may go in.” And to the two sergeants he said:
“Wait outside the door.”

He
heard the familiar tones of Cadfael’s voice as soon as he entered the infirmary
with Adam docile at his heels. They had not taken Brother Humilis into the open
ward, but into one of the small, quiet cells apart, and the door stood open
between. A cot, a stool and a small desk to support book or candle were all the
furnishings, and wide-open door and small, unshuttered window let in light and
air. Brother Fidelis was on his knees by the bed, supporting the sick man in
his arm while Cadfael completed the bandaging of hip and groin where the frail
new scar tissue had split slightly when Humilis fell. They had stripped him
naked, and the cover was drawn back, but Cadfael’s solid body blocked the view
of the bed from the doorway, and at the sound of feet entering Fidelis quickly
drew up the sheet to the patient’s waist. So emaciated was the long body that
the young man could lift it briefly on one arm, but the gaunt face showed clear
and firm as ever, and the hollow eyes were bright. He submitted to being
handled with a wry and patient smile, as to a salutary discipline. It was the
boy who so jealously reached to conceal the ruined body from uninitiated eyes.
Having drawn up the sheet, he turned to take up and shake out the clean linen
shirt that lay ready, lifted it over Humilis’s head, and very adroitly helped
his thin arms into the sleeves, and lifted him to smooth the folds comfortably
under him. Only then did he turn and look towards the doorway.

Hugh
was known and accepted, even welcomed. Humilis and Fidelis as one looked beyond
him to see who followed.

From
behind Hugh’s shoulder the taller stranger looked quickly from face to face,
the mere flicker of a sharp glance that touched and took flight, a lightning
assessment by way of taking stock of what he might have to deal with. Brother
Cadfael, clearly, belonged here and was no threat, the sick man in the bed was
known by repute, but the third brother, who stood close by the cot utterly
still, wide eyes gleaming within the shadow of the cowl, was perhaps not so
easily placed. Adam Heriet looked last and longest at Fidelis, before he
lowered his eyes and composed his face into a closed book.

“Brother
Edmund said we might come in,” said Hugh, “but if we tire you, turn us out. I
am sorry to hear you are not so well.”

“It
will be the best of medicines,” said Humilis, “if you have any better news for
me. Brother Cadfael will not grudge another doctor having a say. I am not so
sick, it was only a faintness — the heat gets ever more oppressive.” His voice
was a little less steady than usual, and slower in utterance, but he breathed
evenly, and his eyes were clear and calm. “Who is this you have brought with
you?”

“Nicholas
will have told you, before he left,” said Hugh,”that we have already questioned
three of the four who rode as escort to the lady Julian when she left for
Wherwell. This is the fourth — Adam Heriet, who went the last part of the way
with her, leaving his fellows in Andover to wait for his return.”

Brother
Humilis stiffened his frail body and sat upright to gaze, and Brother Fidelis
kneeled and braced an arm about him, behind the supporting pillow, stooping his
head into shadow behind his lord’s lean shoulder.

“Is
it so? Then we know all those who guarded her now. So you,” said Humilis,
urgently studying the stalwart figure and blunt, brow-bent face that stooped a
sunburned forehead to him, like a challenged bull, “you must be that one they
said loved her from a child.”

“So
I did,” said Adam Heriet firmly.

“Tell
him,” said Hugh, “how and when you last parted from the lady. Speak up, it is
your story.”

Heriet
drew breath long and deeply, but without any evidence of fear or stress, and
told it again as he had told it to Hugh at Brigge. “She bade me go and leave
her. And so I did. She was my lady, to command me as she chose. What she asked
of me, that I did.”

“And
returned to Andover?” asked Hugh mildly.

“Yes,
my lord.”

“Scarcely
in haste,” said Hugh with the same deceptive gentleness. “From Andover to
Wherwell is but a few short miles, and you say you were dismissed a mile short
of that. Yet you returned to Andover in the dusk, many hours later. Where were
you all that time?”

There
was no mistaking the icy shock that went through Adam, stopping his breath for
an instant. His carefully hooded eyes rolled wide and flashed one wild glance
at Hugh, then were again lowered. It took him a brief and perceptible struggle
to master voice and thoughts, but he did it with heroic smoothness, and even
the pause seemed too brief for the inspired concoction of lies.

“My
lord, I had never been so far south before, and reckoned at that time I never
should again. She dismissed me, and the city of Winchester was there close. I
had heard tell of it, but never thought to see it. I know I had no right so to
borrow time, but I did it. I rode into the town, and there I stayed all that
day. It was peace there, then, a man could walk abroad, view the great church,
eat at an alehouse, all without fear. And so I did, and went back to Andover
only late in the evening. If they have told you so, they tell truth. We never
set out for home until next morning.”

It
was Humilis, who knew the city of Winchester like his own palm, who took up the
interrogation there, drily and calmly, eyes and voice again alert and vigorous.
“Who could blame you for taking a few hours to yourself, with your errand done?
And what did you see and do in Winchester?”

Adam’s
wary breathing eased again readily. This was no problem for him. He launched
into a very full and detailed account of Bishop Henry’s city, from the north
gate, where he had entered, to the meadows of St Cross, and from the cathedral
and the castle of Wolvesey to the north-western fields of Hyde Mead. He could describe
in detail the frontages of the steep High Street, the golden shrine of Saint
Swithun, and the magnificent cross presented by Bishop Henry to his predecessor
Bishop Walkelin’s cathedral. No doubt but he had seen all he claimed to have
seen. Humilis exchanged glances with Hugh and assured him of that. Neither Hugh
nor Cadfael, who stood a little apart, taking note of all, had ever been in
Winchester.

“So
that is all you know of Julian Cruce’s fate,” said Hugh at length.

“Never
word of her, my lord, since we parted that day,” said Adam, with every
appearance of truth. “Unless there is something you can tell me now, as you
know I have asked and asked.” But he was asking no longer, even this repetition
had lost all its former urgency.

“Something
I can and will tell you,” said Hugh abruptly and harshly. “Julian Cruce never
entered Wherwell. The prioress of Wherwell never heard of her. From that day
she has vanished, and you were the last ever to see her. What’s your answer to
that?”

Adam
stood mute, staring, a long minute. “Do you tell me this is true?” he said
slowly.

“I
do tell you so though I think there never was any need to tell you, for you
knew it, none better. As you are now left, the only one who may, who must, know
where she did go, since she never reached Wherwell. Where she went and what
befell her, and whether she is now on this earth or under it.”

“I
swear to God,” said Adam slowly, “that when I parted from my lady at her wish,
I left her whole and well, and I pray she is now, wherever she may be.”

“You
knew, did you not, what valuables she carried with her? Was that enough to
tempt you? Did you, I ask you now in due form, did you rob your mistress and do
her violence when she was left alone with you, and no witness by?”

Fidelis
laid Humilis gently back against his pillows, and stood up tall and straight
beside him. The movement drew Adam’s gaze, and for a moment held it. He said
loudly and clearly: “So far from that, I would have died for her then, and so I
would, gladly, now, rather than she should suffer even one moment’s grief.”

“Very
well!” said Hugh shortly. “That’s your plea. But I must and will keep you in
hold until I know more. For I will know more, Adam, before I let go of this
knot.” He went to the door, where his sergeants waited for their orders, and
called them in. “Take this man and lodge him in the castle. Securely!”

Adam
went out between them without a word of surprise or protest. He had looked for
nothing else, events had hedged him in too closely not to lock the door on him
now. It seemed that he was not greatly discomforted or alarmed, either, though
he was a stout, practised man who would not betray his thoughts. He did cast
one look back from the doorway, a look that embraced them all, but said nothing
and conveyed nothing to Hugh, and little enough to Cadfael. A mere spark, too
small as yet to cast any light.

Chapter Nine

BROTHER
HUMILIS WATCHED THE DEPARTURE OF PRISONER AND GUARDS with a long, unwavering
stare, and when they had vanished he sank back on his bed with a deep sigh, and
lay gazing up into the low stone vault over him.