Marian crossed herself, but did not speak, her pale eyes watching something far beyond the room. A sob escaped her and she turned away, wiping her eyes.
‘I let him die. I refused to help him.’
‘Phillip? But he took you from the abbey,’ said Lucie. The young woman was trembling so hard. Lucie took her hand.
‘I wanted him to pay for what he did. He took me away from all that I loved.’
‘Yes. He hurt you,’ said Lucie.
‘I did nothing for him. Nothing,’ Marian sobbed.
Lucie touched her hot cheeks, shushing her as she would one of the children. ‘Sip your water. Rest a moment.’
‘I will never rest. I am damned.’
‘No one is beyond redemption.’
‘And now I’ve brought trouble on your house. And the city.’
‘You are helping by telling your story so that we might know whether there are others besides Gabriel who might be a threat to us,’ said Owen.
‘How can I know whether or not there are more?’
‘How did you come to leave Wherwell?’ Lucie asked. ‘Did Phillip take you away? How did he gain access?’ She was guessing, connecting bits and pieces of information and intuited pain. ‘Did he tell you?’
‘Lady Edwina had visited me earlier in the year. I wanted to show her one of the manuscripts. The illustrations reminded me of those in a book she had shown me when I first came to stay with her. Dame Eloise permitted me to bring her to my cell off the room where the musical manuscripts were stored. Phillip said she told him about it, answering all his questions, so helpful, he said. From her he learned where I slept, where the music library was. How could she be so—’ Marian stopped herself.
In that moment, watching her fight the anger, push it down – again smoothing the brow, relaxing the mouth, softening the eyes, taking a deep breath, Lucie understood the enigma the young woman presented. She, too, had been shaped by the sisters. Anger is a grievous sin, Lucia. A girl must follow the Blessed Mother’s model – humble, obedient, ever cheerful.
‘How did he use what she had told him?’ Lucie asked.
‘On the Feast of Pentecost he attended a service at the abbey, and afterward hid himself in a garden shed. He bragged of his cleverness to me. At nightfall, he crept out and set a fire beneath the window of the music library. I slept beneath that window. I woke coughing. At first I did not understand, and then I smelled it, felt the smoke in my eyes. A fire! I called out to warn everyone as I ran to assist Dame Eloise, but another sister was already leading her out. And then all was confusion. So many rushing about. I was trying to move the most precious manuscripts out of harm’s way. The smoke made me dizzy. I fell against a burning timber. Someone carried me to a window and tossed me out, shouting at me to roll myself through the dew in the grass. He was waiting there. He picked me up, saying he would take me to a safe place. I thought at first he was the gardener, but the voice. I recognized the voice.’ She stopped, staring down at her hands. ‘I was fighting him, kicking and screaming and I managed to get free. I remember running and seeing that the gates were open so that carts could come with water … I doubled back, ashamed to be running instead of helping. And then – what happened then I know not. I woke up in a barn, dressed in clothes that were not mine, my hair uncovered …’ Her voice broke.
‘You must have been so frightened. And angry.’
Marian met Lucie’s gaze. ‘Angry,’ she whispered. ‘Yes. I have done penance for my anger. And for Dame Eloise and all the sisters, and the manuscripts. I have ached to know how much damage I caused.’
‘You caused?’ Lucie found it difficult to control her own outrage. ‘He started the fire. You rushed to help.’
‘I do not know how, but I inspired in Phillip a belief that God meant us to be together, that I had taken vows in ignorance— He called my vows a mistake.’
‘Arrogant cur,’ Owen muttered. He clenched his hands, holding himself still to listen.
‘You were seven years in the convent,’ said Lucie. ‘I presume he had no contact with you in all that time. He spun a tale that he began to believe. It had nothing to do with you. Did he ask you how you felt? What you wanted?’
‘He believed—’
‘He believed what he wanted to believe,’ Lucie snapped.
‘I want to believe that.’ Marian reached for Lucie’s hand, held it for a moment, whispering her thanks. ‘Shall I go on?’
‘Yes, I pray you, what happened then? Where were you when the pestilence struck him down?’
‘A shed at the edge of a marsh. With a hole for a window, another for a door. He called it a house. A fog of foul vapors surrounded it morning and night. At first I blamed them on his labored breathing, but when the first pustule burst, I knew. Down a track I’d found a village. I had managed to barter for a young woman to come out and cook for us. But when he sickened she disappeared. I searched his bags, hoping to find money for food, and I found my prayer book, the one Dame Edwina had copied for me, and my paternoster beads. He had stolen my prayer book and beads. He had taken me from all that I loved, starved me, dragged me to such a cursed place – was that not enough? He would rob me of these as well?’ She paused. ‘Yes, I admit to my anger, I do. I finally saw what he
