the gatehouse. There were people in one or two houses along the highroad towards St. Giles who had had dealings with him when sick, some whose children he had attended in fever. They might give shelter to a young man at his recommendation, though he did not much like the idea of involving them. Or there was, at the end of this stretch of road, the leper hospital of St. Giles, where young brothers often served a part of their novitiate in attendance on those less fortunate. Something, surely, might be arranged to hide one haunted boy.
Incredulously, Cadfael heard his own name spoken, and was jerked sharply out of his planning. Across the chapter-house, in his stall as close as possible to Prior Robert, Brother Jerome had risen, and was in full spate, his meagre figure deceptively humble in stance, his sharp eyes half-hooded in holy meekness. And he had just uttered Brother Cadfael’s name, with odious concern and affection!
“… I do not say, Father, that there has been any impropriety in our dearly valued brother’s conduct. I do but appeal for aid and guidance for his soul’s sake, for he stands in peril. Father, it has come to my knowledge that many years since, before his call to this blessed vocation, Brother Cadfael was in a relationship of worldly affection with the lady who is now Mistress Bonel, and a guest of this house. By reason of the death of her husband he was drawn back into contact with her, by no fault of his, oh, no, I do not speak of blame, for he was called to help a dying man. But consider, Father, how severe a test may be imposed upon a brother’s sincere devotion, when he is again brought unexpectedly into so close touch with a long-forgotten attachment according to this world!”
To judge by Prior Robert’s loftily erected head and stretched neck, which enabled him to look from an even greater height down his nose at the imperilled brother, he was indeed considering it. So was Cadfael, with astonished indignation that congealed rapidly into cool, inimical comprehension. He had underestimated Brother Jerome’s audacity, no less than his venom. That large, sinewy ear must have been pressed lovingly to the large keyhole of Richildis’s door, to have gathered so much.
“Do you allege,” demanded Robert incredulously, “that Brother Cadfael has been in unlawful conversation with this woman? On what occasion? We ourselves know well that he attended Master Bonel’s death-bed, and did his best for the unfortunate, and that the unhappy wife was then present. We have no reproach to make upon that count, it was his duty to go where he was needed.”
Brother Cadfael, as yet unaddressed, sat grimly silent, and let them proceed, for obviously this attack came as unexpectedly to Robert as to him.
“Oh, no man of us can question that,” agreed Jerome obligingly. “It was his Christian duty to give aid according to his skills, and so he did. But as I have learned, our brother has again visited the widow and spoken with her, only last night. Doubtless for purposes of comfort and blessing to the bereaved. But what dangers may lurk in such a meeting, Father, I need not try to express. God forbid it should ever enter any mind, that a man once betrothed, and having lost his affianced wife to another, should succumb to jealousy in his late years, after abandoning the world, when he once again encounters the former object of his affections. No, that we may not even consider. But would it not be better if our beloved brother should be removed utterly even from the temptations of memory? I speak as one having his wellbeing and spiritual health at heart.”
You speak, thought Cadfael, grinding his teeth, as one at last provided with a weapon against a man you’ve hated for years with little effect. And, God forgive me, if I could wring your scrawny neck now, I would do it and rejoice.
He rose and stood forth from his retired place to be seen. “I am here, Father Prior, examine me of my actions as you wish. Brother Jerome is somewhat over-tender of my vocation, which is in no danger.” And that, at least, was heartfelt.
Prior Robert continued to look down at him all too thoughtfully for Cadfael’s liking. He would certainly fight any suggestion of misconduct among his flock, and defend them to the world for his own sake, but he might also welcome an opportunity of curbing the independent activities of a man who always caused him slight discomfort, as though he found in Cadfael’s blunt, practical, tolerant self-sufficiency a hidden vein of desire of satire and amusement. He was no fool, and could hardly have failed to notice that he was being obliquely invited to believe that Cadfael might, when confronted with his old sweetheart married to another, have so far succumbed to jealousy as to remove his rival from the world with his own hands. Who, after all, knew the properties of herbs and plants better, or the proportions in which they could be used for good or ill? God forbid it should enter any mind, Jerome had said piously, neatly planting the notion as he deplored it. Doubtful if Robert would seriously entertain any such thought, but neither would he censure it in Jerome, who was unfailingly useful and obsequious to him. Nor could it be argued that the thing was altogether impossible. Cadfael had made the monk’s-hood oil, and knew what could be done with it. He had not even to procure it secretly, he had it in his own charge; and if he had been sent for in haste to a man already sick to death, who was to say he had not first administered the poison he feigned to combat? And I watched Aelfric cross the court, thought Cadfael, and might easily have stopped him for a word, lifted the lid in curiosity at the savoury smell, been told for whom it was sent, and added another savour of my own making? A moment’s distraction, and it could have been done. How easy it is to bring on oneself a suspicion there’s no disproving!
“Is it indeed truth, brother,” asked Robert weightily, “that Mistress Bonel was intimately known to you in your youth, before you took vows?”
“It is,” said Cadfael directly, “if by intimately you mean only well and closely, on terms of affection. Before I took the Cross we held ourselves to be affianced, though no one else knew of it. That was more than forty years ago, and I had not seen her since. She married in my absence, and I, after my return, took the cowl.” The fewer words here, the better.
“Why did you never say word of this, when they came to our house?”
“I did not know who Mistress Bonel was, until I saw her. The name meant nothing to me, I knew only of her first marriage. I was called to the house, as you know, and went in good faith.”
“That I acknowledge,” conceded Robert. “I did not observe anything untoward in your conduct there.”
“I do not suggest, Father Prior,” Jerome made haste to assure him, “that Brother Cadfael has done anything deserving of blame …” The lingering ending added silently:”… as yet!” but he did not go so far as to utter it. “I am concerned only for his protection from the snares of temptation. The devil can betray even through a Christian affection.”
Prior Robert was continuing his heavy and intent study of Cadfael, and if he was not expressing condemnation, there was no mistaking the disapproval in his elevated eyebrows and distended nostrils. No inmate of his convent should even admit to noticing a woman, unless by way of Christian ministry or hard-headed business. “In attending a sick man, certainly you did only right, Brother Cadfael. But is it also true that you visited this woman last night? Why should that be? If she was in need of spiritual comfort, there is here also a parish priest. Two days ago you had a right and proper reason for going there, last night you surely had none.”
“I went there,” said Cadfael patiently, since there was no help in impatience, and nothing could mortify Brother Jerome so much as to be treated with detached forbearance, “to ask certain questions which may bear upon her husband’s death—a matter which you, Father Prior, and I, and all here, must devoutly wish to be cleared up as quickly as possible, so that this house may be in peace.”
