Hugh watched the infirmarer warily. There was no need for her to go quite so close to the knight, nor to stop and stand near Baldwin when she was walking past on her way to the chamber. He was about to demand what she was doing when she suddenly went off behind the curtain.
“Well? Did you expect her to stab him in front of you?” Joan asked, then cackled to herself.
Hugh glowered at the floor and shrugged his shoulders, evading her sharp eye. “I was told to keep a lookout on my master’s friend.“
“Course you were, young man, but there’s no need to act so oddly around Constance. She’s a good lass.”
“I am, am I?“ Constance said, reappearing in the doorway. ”And you’re a dreadful old woman, Joan.“
“Now then, Sister. Don’t forget, we nuns always maintain a polite distance in front of men,” Joan said disdainfully, and then laughed, slapping her thigh with delight at her witticism.
Joan gave Hugh a tolerant smile. It was easy to like Joan. She was known to all the nuns; for many her face was the first they would see on entering the cloister. Certainly she was fearsome, almost dragon-like to the younger entrants, but once the girls got to know her, they saw the warmth of her heart. Joan was a permanent fixture of the place, and she felt that she had the right to make jokes at the expense of any of the other sisters or of the institution itself, just as she saw fit.
Woe betide the fool who tried to join her in belittling the convent, however. That was tantamount to a felony in Joan’s view. She would tolerate making fun of the other sisters, but the place itself was sacrosanct. Joan had earned the right to have digs at the priory, but only as the reward for her life of service. There was no excuse, she felt, for youngsters taking the rise out of the place, and she would be quick to snap at them.
“Why in front of men?” Hugh said, glancing doubtfully from one to the other.
“Who knows what you men would make of us if you knew what truly went on in our minds, young fellow?” Joan chuckled.
Constance felt her face redden, and she busied herself with cleaning some pots and carefully drying them.
“People think nuns are religious and spend their whole time walking about with their hands in their sleeves, heads down, daydreaming about the life to come, don’t they? Or they think all women in convents are so starved of sex that any man who cuts a well-shaped thigh and ankle in hose would be exhausted after two seconds flat in a place housing so many lusty young women. That’s right, isn’t it?” she said, her voice suddenly louder.
Hugh was startled into a partial reply. “I doubt it. Most men think women in the cloisters are already part of the way to heaven, so they don’t figure much in our thoughts.“
“Ah, but why? Because the women are the Brides of Christ, or because it’s too much bother to walk all the way to their convents, and too much like hard work to go to the effort of climbing the claustral wall to get at them, especially when the precinct might have guards to defend the women’s innocence?”
Hugh was flustered by her questioning and shrugged again, his face growing darker with his suspicion that Joan’s conversation had a point, and that point was to belittle Hugh.
Joan watched him like a viper staring at a mouse, bolt upright, her watery blue eyes intent, but then she suddenly sank back. “I know what men are like, young fellow; after living here for more than fifty years, I have a good idea what goes on in the mind of the average villein or freeman, because I meet them when they come here, and always it’s the same. Nuns are either mad because they can’t cope with “real men” in the “real world” and run away from the smelly and rather foolish acrobatics which go hand in glove with sex – and if they don’t think that, they assume that all nuns are lusty wenches who will fulfil every erotic dream of the most pox-ridden and pox- marked bastard born to a serf.“
“I’m sorry,” Hugh said and his head was hanging now, recalling his thoughts in the tavern on his way to this place. He had been persuaded that the only reason why his hose would stay resolutely tied to his tunic was the fact that he was too low-born for a wealthy nun, he recalled and now, listening to the bitter, tired old woman, he felt guilty.
“Don’t be so silly, fellow! What sort of a churl are you?” Joan said. “You forget that women here are the same as women outside, except we have taken the vow of chastity. We have the same dreams and desires as any woman who lives outside. Often nuns will fail in their oaths, but they can be forgiven that, because to fail is human. Such women can regain their position in God’s love, because He understands our frailty, and while many will enter His kingdom after a life of unremitting effort and good works, I always like to think that He would prefer one or two darker horses up there with Him, just to protect Him from the utter tedium of dealing with the most perfect people.” She suddenly shot him a sharp glance. “Don’t you think He would soon be bored with only do- gooders to talk to?”
Hugh mumbled, but Constance gave a short laugh. “Joan, you are cruel to tease the fellow. He knows he shouldn’t answer: if he agrees with you, you’ll tell him he’s no better than a heathen, and if he disagrees you’ll tell him he’s a fool. Leave him be.”
Joan cast her a sly look, and Constance lifted an eyebrow sardonically. At the sight Joan grinned and settled herself back in her chair.
Constance mixed spices with wine in a jug and set it near the fire. As she passed, she touched Joan’s hand with gratitude, for the older woman’s meaning was all too clear to her: all nuns failed occasionally, and there was always mercy and forgiveness. A moment later, Joan rose and went from the room. Constance returned to her bench; she felt little desire for forgiveness. She would trade it for an hour in Elias’s arms any day, and no matter how many kindly words dear Joan gave her, she would always remember her lover’s strong embrace.
Elias – whom she had told only the previous night that Katerine had threatened to expose them…
“I am deeply sorry that this has happened to your friend,” Lady Elizabeth said when she and Simon arrived in the cloister. “Let me know if there is anything I can do to help you.”
“Thank you. Of course the matter is in Bishop Bertrand’s hands…”
“Let’s not try to fool each other, eh, Bailiff? The good bishop loathes me, and the feeling is mutual. If he can, he will see me thrown from here, while you have a perfectly natural desire to avenge your friend. As far as I am concerned, that makes you much more likely to catch the murderer.”
Simon grinned. “Very well – but Bertrand carries the responsibility. Do you mind if I speak to your nuns here?”
She set her head to one side. “No,” she said at last. “But do treat them gently. Some of the women here are not used to meeting men at all, let alone being interrogated.”
Simon promised to be careful and left her to return to her desk while he walked to the nuns’ frater. He wanted to see if he could learn anything from the women about the dead novice.
There were only two in the room: one nun and a novice, sitting on a bench up near the screens. Recognising the sacrist, Denise, he considered a moment, then approached.
“Ah, the bailiff!” Denise raised her pot in salutation. She was drunk, although not yet incapable. Wine had trailed down her chin to puddle on her breast, and her eyes were too bright. “So you haven’t been harmed yet?”
Simon stiffened, but forced his tone to remain easy. “Denise, you know that Katerine is dead and my friend hurt. Did you see anything?”
She fixed upon him a face filled with the vacuity of drunkenness. Lifting her pot, she drank, spilling more of the drink down her tunic. At last she took the pot away and grunted with pleasure. “Bailiff, this has been a terrible shock. I was sitting in here when I heard someone cry out, and a few minutes later I saw poor Katerine being carried out from the church and taken to rest with Moll. Poor Katerine! Awful! I’m not used to bloodshed, you know,” she declared, peering once more into her cup and taking a deep draught.
“Was anyone here with you?”
“Oh, yes. Agnes here was with me all the time. I don’t know if she noticed anything.”
“I saw nothing. I heard noises from the canons’ cloister, but that’s all.”
“You heard nothing apart from that?” Simon asked. “And you were both in here?”
Agnes wouldn’t meet his look, leaving it to Denise to say, “What else could we have seen, Bailiff? We were here. It’s not as if we would have had any reason to wander in the canons’ side, is it?”
Jeanne was in the hall when she heard them. Immediately she dropped the tapestry she had been stitching
