This silence was brief indeed, but pregnant. If he said yes, boldly, he lied. If not, at least he might be telling truth.
“No, my lord, I did not,” said Adam heavily. “I wish I had, but she would not have it so. We lay the last night at Andover, and then I went on with her the last few miles. When we came within a mile-but it was not within sight yet, and there were small woodlands between-she sent me back, and said she would go the end of the way alone. I did what she wished. I had done what she wished since I carried her in my arms, barely a year old,” he said, with the first flash of fire out of his dark composure, like brief lightning out of banked clouds.
“And the other three?” asked Hugh mildly.
“We left them in Andover. When I returned we set out for home all together.”
Hugh said nothing yet about the discrepancy in time. That might well be held in reserve, to be sprung on him when he was away from this family solidarity, and less sure of himself.
“And you know nothing of Julian Cruce since that day?”
“No, my lord, nothing. And if you do, for God’s sake let me know of it, worst or best!”
“You were devoted to this lady?”
“I would have died for her. I would die for her now.”
Well, so you may yet, thought Hugh, if you turn out to be the best player of a part that ever put on a false face. He was in two minds about this man, whose brief flashes of passion had all the force of truth, and yet who picked his way among words with a rare subtlety.
Why, if he had nothing to hide?
“You have a horse here, Adam?”
The man lifted upon him a long, calculating stare, from eyes deep-set beneath bushy brows. “I have, my lord.”
“Then I must ask you to saddle and ride With me.”
It was an asking that could not be refused, and Adam Heriet was well aware of it, but at least it was put in a fashion which enabled him to rise and go with composed dignity. He pushed back the bench and stood clear.
“Ride where, my lord?” And to the freckled boy,” watching dubiously from the shadows, he said: “Go and saddle for me, lad, make yourself useful.”
Adam the younger went, though not willingly, and with a long backward glance over his shoulder, and in a moment or two hooves thudded on the hard-beaten earth of the yard.
“You must know,” said Hugh, “all the circumstances of the lady’s decision to enter a convent. You know she was betrothed as a child to Godfrid Marescot, and that he broke off the match to become a monk at Hyde Mead.”
“Yes, I do know.”
“After the-burning of Hyde, Godfrid Marescot came to Shrewsbury in the dispersal that followed. Since the sack of Wherwell, he frets for news of the girl, and whether you can bring him any or no, Adam, I would have you come with me and visit him.” Not a word yet of the small matter of her non-arrival at the refuge she had chosen. Nor was there any way of knowing from this experienced and well-regulated face whether Adam knew of it or no. “If you cannot shed light,” said Hugh amiably, “at least you can speak to him of her, share a remembrance heavy enough, as things are now, to carry alone.”
Adam drew a long, slow, cautious breath. “I will well, my lord. He was a fine man, so everyone reports of him. Old for her, but a fine man. It was great pity. She used to prattle about him, proud as if he was making a queen of her. Pity such a lass should ever take to the cloister. She would have been his fair match. I knew her. I’ll ride with you in goodwill.” And to the husband and wife who stood close together, wondering and distrustful, he said calmly: “Shrewsbury is not far. You’ll see me back again before you know it.”
It was a strange and yet an everyday ride back to Shrewsbury. All the way this hardened and resilient man-at- arms conducted himself as though he did not know he was a prisoner, and suspect of something not yet revealed, while very well knowing that two sergeants rode one at either quarter behind him, in case he should make a break for freedom. He rode well, and had a very decent horse beneath him, and must be a man held in good repute and trusted by his commander to be loosed as he pleased, and thus well provided. Concerning his own situation he asked nothing, and betrayed no anxiety; but three times at least before they came in sight of Saint Giles he asked: “My lord, did you ever hear word of her at all, after the troubles fell on Winchester?”
“Sir, if you have made enquiries round Wherwell, did you come upon any trace? There must have been many nuns scattered there.”
And last, in abrupt pleading: “My lord, if you do know, is she living or dead?”
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
