‘He has the freedom of the wards,’ said Hugh, and added no further enlightenment.
‘Then, Hugh, if you would be kind enough to provide Pernel with some token that would let her in to him, I think they might spend the time more pleasantly together than apart, while we confer? Without prejudice,’ she said gently,’to any proceedings you may have in mind later.’
Cadfael saw Hugh’s black, betraying brows twitch, and lift into oblique appreciation, and thanked God devoutly for an understanding rare between two so different.
‘I will give her my glove,’ said Hugh, and cast one sharp, enjoying glance aside at the mute girl in the doorway. ‘No one will question it, no need for more.’ And he turned and took Pernel by the hand, and went out with her.
Their plans had been made, of course, last night or this morning, in the solar at Longner where the truth came forth so far as truth was known, or on the journey at dawn, before they ever reached the ferry over Severn, where Cadfael had met them. A conspiracy of women had been hatched in Eudo’s hall, that kept due consideration of Eudo’s rights and needs, of his wife’s contented pregnancy, even as it nurtured and advanced Pernel Otmere’s determined pursuit of a truth that would set Sulien Blount free from every haunted and chivalrous burden that weighed him down. The young one and the old one?old not in years, only in the rapidity of her advance upon death?they had come together like lodestone and metal, to compound their own justice.
Hugh came back into the room smiling, though the smile was invisible to all but Cadfael. A burdened smile, none the less, for he, too, was in pursuit of a truth which might not be Pernel’s truth. He closed the door firmly on the world without.
‘Now, madam, in what particular can we be of service to you?’
She had composed herself into a settled stillness which could be sustained through a long conference. Without her cloak she made so slight a figure, it seemed a man could have spanned her body with his hands.
‘I must thank you, my lords,’ she said, ‘for granting me this audience. I should have asked for it earlier, but only yesterday did I hear of this matter which has been troubling you both. My family are too careful of me, and their intent was to spare me any knowledge that might be distressing. A mistake! There is nothing more distressing than to find out, very late, that those who rearrange circumstances around you to spare you pain have themselves been agonising day and night. And needlessly, to no purpose. It is an indignity, would not you think, to be protected by people you know, in your own mind, to be more in need of protection than you have ever been, or ever will be? Still, it is an error of affection. I cannot complain of it. But I need no longer suffer it. Pernel has had the good sense to tell me what no one else would. But there are still things I do not know, since she did not yet know them herself. May I ask?’
‘Ask whatever you wish,’ said the abbot. ‘In your own time, and tell us if you need to rest.’
‘True,’ said Donata,’there is no haste now. Those who are dead are safe enough”, and those still living and wound into this coil, I trust, are also safe. I have learned that my son Sulien has given you some cause to believe him guilty of this death which is come to judgement here. Is he still suspect?’
‘No,’ said Hugh without hesitation. ‘Certainly not of murder. Though he has said, and maintains, and will not be persuaded to depart from it, that he is willing to confess to murder. And if need be, to die for it.’
She nodded her head slowly, unsurprised. The stiff folds of linen rustled softly against her cheeks. ‘I thought it might be so. When Brother Cadfael here came for him yesterday, I knew nothing to make me wonder or question. I thought all was as it seemed, and that you, Father, had still some doubts whether he had not made a wrong decision, and should not be advised to think more deeply about abandoning his vocation. But when Pernel told me how Generys had been found, and how my son had set himself to prove Ruald blameless, by proving this could not in fact be Generys
And then how he exerted himself, once again, to find the woman Gunnild alive
Then I understood that he had brought in evitable suspicion upon himself, as one knowing far too much. So much wasted exertion, if only I had known! And he was willing to take that load upon him? Well, but it seems you have already seen through that pretence, with no aid from me. May I take it, Hugh, that you have been in Peterborough? We heard that you were newly back from the Fen country, and since Sulien was sent for so promptly after your return, I could not fail to conclude the two were connected.’
‘Yes,’ said Hugh, ‘I went to Peterborough.’
‘And you found that he had lied?’
‘Yes, he had lied. The silversmith lodged him overnight, true. But he never gave him the ring, never saw the ring, never bought anything from Generys. Yes, Sulien lied.’
‘And yesterday? Being found out in his lies, what did he tell you yesterday?’
‘He said that he had the ring all along, that Generys had given it to him.’
‘One lie leads to another,’ she said with a deep sigh. ‘He felt he had good cause, but there is never cause good enough. Always lies come to grief. I can tell you where he got the ring. He took it from a small box I keep in my press. There are a few other things in it, a pin for fastening a cloak, a plain silver torque, a ribbon
All trifles, but they could have been recognised, and given her a name, even after years.’
‘Are you saying,’ asked Radulfus, listening incredulously to the quiet, detached tone of the voice that uttered such things,’that these things were taken from the dead woman? That she is indeed Generys, Ruald’s wife?’
‘Yes, she is indeed Generys. I could have named her at once, if anyone had asked me. I would have named her. I do not deal in lies. And yes, the trinkets were all hers.’
‘It is a terrible sin,’ said the abbot heavily,’to steal from the dead.’
“There was no such intent,’ she said with unshakable calm. ‘But without them, after no very long time, no one would be able to name her. As you found, no one was. But it was not my choice, I would not have gone to such lengths. I think it must have been when Sulien brought my lord’s body back from Salisbury, after Wilton, and we buried him and set all his affairs and debts in order, that Sulien found the box. He would know the ring. When he needed his proof, to show that she still lived, then he came home and took it. Her possessions no one has ever worn or touched, otherwise. Simply, they are in safe keeping. I will readily deliver them up to you, or to anyone who has a claim. Until last night I had not opened the box since first it was laid there. I did not know what he had done. Neither did Eudo. He knows nothing about this. Nor never shall.’
From his preferred corner, where he could observe without involvement, Cadfael spoke for the first time. ‘I think, also, you may not yet know all you would wish to know about your son Sulien. Look back to the time when
