‘No,’ said Sulien. ‘I am saying that I loved her, and she admitted me some small way into her grief, when she was in mortal need. If my torment was any ease to hers, that time was not wasted. If you mean, did she admit me even into her bed, no, that she never did, nor I never asked nor hoped for it. My significance, my usefulness, never came so high.’
‘And when she vanished,’ Hugh pursued with relentless patience, ‘what did you know of that?’
‘Nothing, no more than any other man.’
‘What did you suppose had become of her?’
‘My time,’ said Sulien, ‘was over by then, she had done with me. I believed what the world believed, that she had taken up her roots and fled the place that had become abhorrent to her.’
‘With another lover?’ Hugh asked evenly. ‘The world believed so.’
‘With a lover or alone. How could I know?’
‘Truly! You knew no more than any other man. Yet when you came back here, and heard that we had found a woman’s body buried in the Potter’s Field, you knew that it must be she.’
‘I knew,’ said Sulien with aching care,’that it was the common belief that it must be. I did not know that it was.’
‘True, again! You had no secret knowledge, so equally you could not know that it was not Generys. Yet you felt it necessary at once to make up your lying story, and produce the ring she had given you, as you now say, in order to prove that she was well alive and far enough away to make confirmation hard, and to lift the shadow of suspicion from Ruald. Without respect to his guilt or innocence, for according to the account you give of yourself now, you did not know whether she was alive or dead, nor whether he had or had not killed her.’
‘No!’ said Sulien, with a sudden flush of energy and indignation that jerked his braced body forward from the panelled wall, ‘That I did know, because I know him. It is inconceivable that he could ever have harmed her. It is not in the man to do murder.’
‘Happy the man whose friends can be so sure of him!’ said Hugh drily. ‘Very well, pass on to what followed. We had no cause to doubt your word then; you had proved, had you not, that Generys was alive? Therefore we looked about us for other possibilities, and found another woman who had frequented there, and not been seen of late. And behold, your hand is seen again moulding matters. From the moment you heard of the pedlar’s arrest you began a hunt for some manor where the woman might have found a shelter through the winter, where someone might be able to testify to her being alive well after she parted from Britric. I doubt if you expected to find her still settled there, but I am sure you were glad of it. It meant you need not appear, she could come forward of her own accord, having heard there was a man charged with her murder. Twice, Sulien? Twice are we to accept your hand for the hand of God, with no more pressing motive than pure love of justice? Since you had so infallibly proved the dead woman could not be Generys, why should you be so sure she was not Gunnild? Two such rescues were one too many to be believed in. Gunnild’s survival was proven, she came, she spoke, she was flesh and blood beyond doubt. But for the life of Generys we have only your word. And your word is shown to be false. I think we need look no further for a name for the woman we found. By denying her a name, you have named her.’
Sulien had shut his lips and clenched his teeth, as though he would never speak another word. It was too late to deploy any more lies.
*l think,’ said Hugh,’that when you heard what the abbey plough had turned up out of the soil, you were never in a moment’s doubt as to her name. I think you knew very well that she was there. And you were quite certain that Ruald was not her murderer. Oh, that I believe! A certainty, Sulien, to which only God can be entitled, who knows all things with certainty. Only God, and you, who knew all too well who the murderer was.’
‘Child,’ said Radulfus into the prolonged silence, ‘if you have an answer to this, speak out now. If there is guilt on your soul, do not continue obdurate, but confess it. If not, then tell us what your answer is, for you have brought this suspicion upon yourself. To your credit, it seems that you would not have another man, be he friend or stranger, bear the burden of a crime not his to answer. That I should expect of you. But the lies are not worthy, not even in such a cause. Better by far to deliver all others, and say outright: I am the man, look no further.’
Silence fell again, and this time lasted even longer, so that Cadfael felt the extreme stillness in the room as a weight upon his flesh and a constriction upon his breath. Outside the window dusk had gathered in thin, low, featureless cloud, a leaden grey sucking out all colour from the world. Sulien sat motionless, shoulders braced back to feel the solid wall supporting him, eyelids half lowered over the dimmed blue of his eyes. After a long tune he stirred, and raised both hands to press and flex with stiff fingers at his cheeks, as though the desperation in which he found himself had cramped even his flesh, and he must work the paralysing chill out of it before he could speak. But when he did speak, it was in a voice low, reasonable and persuasive, and he lifted his head and confronted Hugh with the composure of one who has reached a decision and a stance from which he will not easily be shifted.
‘Very well! I have lied, and lied again, and I love lies no more than you do, my lord. But if I make a bargain with you, I swear to you I shall keep it faithfully. I have not confessed to anything, yet. But I will give you my confession to murder, upon conditions!’
‘Conditions?’ said Hugh, with black brows obliquely raised in wry amusement.
‘They need not limit in any degree what can be done to me,’ said Sulien, as gently as if he argued a sensible case to which all sane men must consent once they heard it. ‘All I want is that my mother and my family shall suffer no dishonour and no disgrace by me. Why should not a bargain be struck even over matters of life and death, if it can spare all those who are not to blame, and destroy only the guilty?’
‘You are offering me a confession,’ said Hugh, ‘in exchange for blanketing this whole matter in silence?’
The abbot had risen to his feet, a hand raised in indignant protest. ‘There can be no bargaining over murder. You must withdraw, my son, you are adding insult to your offence.’
‘No,’ said Hugh, ‘let him speak. Every man deserves a hearing. Go on, Sulien, what is it you are offering and asking?’
‘Something which could very simply be done. I have been summoned here, where I chose to abandon my calling,’ Sulien began in the same measured and persuasive voice. ‘Would it be so strange if I should change yet again, and return to my vocation here as a penitent? Father Abbot here, I’m sure, could win me if he tried.’ Radulfus was frowning at this moment in controlled disapproval, not of the misuse being made of his influence and office, but of the note of despairing levity which had crept into the young man’s voice. ‘My mother is in her death illness,’ said Sulien, ‘and my brother has an honoured name, like our father before us, a wife, and a child to come next year, and has done no wrong to any man, and knows of none. For God’s sake leave them in peace, let them keep their name
