“I know,” said Sanan with slow solemnity, following Cadfael’s movements with intent eyes, “that you discovered Ninian before even my step-father betrayed him. I know he told you freely who he is and what he’s about, and you said you had nothing against any honest man of either party, and would do nothing to harm him. And you’ve kept his secret until now, when it’s no longer a secret. He trusts you, and I am resolved to trust you.”
“No,” said Cadfael hastily, “tell me nothing! If I don’t know where the boy is now, no one can get it out of me, and I can declare my ignorance with a good conscience. I like a gallant lad, even if he is too rash for his own good. He tells me his whole aim now is to reach the Empress, at whatever cost, and offer her his services. He has a right to dispose of his own efforts as he pleases, and I wish him a safe arrival and long life. Such a madcap deserves to have luck on his side.”
“I know,” she said, flushing and smiling, “he is not very discreet
“
“Discreet? I doubt if he knows the meaning of the word! To write and send such a letter, open as the day, signed with his own name and telling where and under what pretence he’s to be found! No, never tell me where he is now, but wherever you’ve hidden him, keep a weather eye on him, for there’s no knowing what breathless foolishness he’ll be up to next.” He had been busy filling a small flask, to provide her with a respectable reason for emerging from his herbarium. He sealed it with a wooden stopper and tied it down at the neck under a wisp of thin parchment before wrapping it in a piece of linen and putting it into her hands. “There, madam, is your permit to be here. And my advice is, get him away as soon as you can.”
“But he won’t go,” she said, sighing, but with pride rather than exasperation, “not while this matter is unresolved. He won’t budge until he knows Diota is safe. And there are preparations to make?means to provide
” She shook herself bracingly, tossed her brown head, and made briskly for the door.
“His first need,” said Cadfael thoughtfully after her, “will be a good horse.”
She turned about abruptly in the doorway, and gave him a blazing smile, throwing aside all reservations.
“Two horses!” she said in a soft, triumphant whisper. “I am of the Empress’s party, too. I am going with him!”
Chapter Nine
Cadfael was uneasy in his mind all that day, plagued on the one hand by misgivings about Sanan’s revelation, and on the other by the elusive gnat that sang in the back of his consciousness, telling him persistently that he had failed to notice the loss of one item that should have been sought with Ailnoth, and might very well have missed another. There was certainly something he should have thought of, something that might shed light, if only he could discover what it was, and go, belatedly, to look for it.
In the meantime, he pursued the round of his duties through Vespers and supper in the refectory, and tried in vain to concentrate upon the psalms for this thirtieth day of December, the sixth day in the octave of Christmas.
Cynric had been right about the thaw. It came furtively and grudgingly, but it was certainly on its way by mid afternoon. The trees were shedding their tinkling filigree of frozen rime and standing starkly black against a low sky. Drips perforated the whiteness under the eaves with small dark pockmarks, and the black of the road and the green of grass were beginning to show through the covering of snow. By morning it might even be possible to break the ground, in that chosen spot sheltered under the precinct wall, and dig Father Ailnoth’s grave.
Cadfael had examined the skullcap closely, and could make no great sense of it. Yet it fretted him simply because he had failed to think of it when the body was found.
As for the damage to it, that suggested a connection with the blow to the head, and yet at the same time contradicted that connection, since in that event the cap would surely have fallen on land, when the blow was struck. True, the assailant might very well have thrown it into the water after the priest, but in the dark would he have noticed or thought of it, and if he had, would he necessarily have been able to find it? A small black thing in tufted grass not yet white with rime not easy to see, and unlikely to be remembered as too dangerous to leave, when murder had been committed. Who was going to grope around in the dark in rough grass, when he had just killed a man? His one thought would be to get well away from the scene as quickly as possible.
Well, if Cadfael had missed this one thing, he might have missed?his demon was nagging at him that he had missed!?another as important. And if he had, it was still there by the mill, either along the bank or in the water, or even within the mill itself. No use looking for it elsewhere.
There was half an hour left before Compline, and most of the brothers, very sensibly, were in the warming room, getting the chill out of their bones. It was folly to think of going near the mill at this hour, in the dark, but for all that Cadfael could not keep away, his mind so dwelt upon the place, as though the very ambience of the pool, the mill and the solitary night might reproduce the events of Christmas Eve, and prod his memory into recapturing the lost factor. He crossed the great court to the retired corner by the infirmary, where the wicket in the precinct wall led through directly to the mill.
Outside, with no moon and only ragged glimpses of stars, he stood until his eyes grew accustomed to the night, and the shapes of things grew out of obscurity. The rough grass of the field, the dark bulk of the mill to his right, with the little wooden bridge at the corner of the building immediately before him, crossing the head-race to the overhanging bank of the pool. He crossed, his feet making a small, clear, hollow sound on the planks, and walked across the narrow strip of grass to the bank. The expanse of the water opened beneath him, pale, leaden- still, dappled with patches of open water, rimmed round with half-thawed ice.
Nothing moved here but himself, there was nothing to be heard, not even a breath of wind stirring in the lissome naked shoots of the pollarded willows at his left hand along the bank. A few yards along there, just past the nearest stump, cut down to hip-height and bristling with wands like hair on the giant head of a terrified man, they had drawn Ailnoth’s body laboriously along under the eroded bank, and brought him to shore where the meadow sloped down more gently to the outflow of the tail-race.
In his recollection of the morning every detail stood sharply defined, but shed no light at all on what had happened in the night. He turned from the high bank and walked back across the bridge, and for no good reason that he could see continued round the mill, and down the sloping bank to the big doors where the grain was carried in. Only an outer bar fastened the door, and that, he saw dimly by the faint reflection from bleached timber, was drawn back from its socket. There was a small door on the higher level, giving quick access to the wicket in the precinct wall. That could be fastened within. But why should this heavy bar be drawn back unless someone had made entry from without?
Cadfael set his hand to the closed but unbarred door, eased it open by a hand’s breadth, and stiffened to listen
