intelligence, and had certainly heard most of what had been said. The miller, perhaps deliberately, had let them go well ahead of him. His sole concern was that whatever Sister Magdalen designed was good and wise, and nothing and no one should be allowed to frustrate it. Of curiosity he had very little. What he needed to know in order to be of use to her she would tell him. He had been her able supporter so long now that there were things between them that could be communicated and understood without words. They had reached Maerdol-head, and halted outside the Vestier house. Cadfael helped Judith down from the saddle, for the passage through the frontage to the yard, though wide enough, was too low for entering mounted. She had barely set foot to the ground when the saddler from the shop next door came peering out from his doorway in round-eyed astonishment, and bolted as suddenly back again to relay the news to some customer within. Cadfael took the white mule’s bridle, and followed Judith in through the dim passage and into the yard. From the shed on the right the rhythmic clack of the looms met them, and from the hall the faint sound of muted voices. The women sounded subdued and dispirited at their spinning, and there was no singing in this house of mourning.
Branwen was just crossing the yard to the hall door, and turned at the crisp sound of the small hooves on the beaten earth of the passage. She gave a sharp, high-pitched cry, half started towards her mistress, her face brightening into wonder and pleasure, and then changed her mind and turned and ran for the house, shouting for Dame Agatha, for Miles, for all the household to come quickly and see who was here. And in headlong haste Miles came bursting out from the hall, to stare wildly, burn up like a lighted lamp, and rush with open arms to embrace his cousin.
“Judith
Judith, it is you! Oh, my dear heart, all this time where were you? Where were you? While we’ve all been sweating and worrying, and hunting every ditch and alley for you? God knows I began to think I might never see you again. Where have you been? What happened to you?”
Before he had finished exclaiming his mother was there, overflowing with tearful endearments and pious thanks to God at seeing her niece home again, alive and well. Judith submitted patiently to all, and was spared having to answer until they had run out of questions, by which time all the spinning-women were out in the yard, and the weavers from their looms, and a dozen voices at once made a babel in which she would not have been heard, even if she had spoken. A wind of joy blew through the house of mourning, and could not be quenched even when Bertred’s mother came out to stare with the rest.
“I am sorry,” said Judith, when there was a lull in the gale, “that you have been concerned about me, that was no intent of mine. But now you see I’m whole and unharmed, no need to trouble further. I shall not be lost again. I have been at Godric’s Ford with Sister Magdalen, who has been kind enough to ride back with me. Aunt Agatha, will you prepare a bed for my guest? Sister Magdalen will stay with me overnight.”
Agatha looked from her niece to the nun, and back again, with a soft smile on her lips and a shrewdly hopeful light in her blue eyes. The girl was come home with her patroness from the cloister. Surely she had returned to that former longing for the peace of renunciation, why else should she run away to a Benedictine nunnery?
“I will, with all my heart!” said Agatha fervently. “Sister, you’re warmly welcome. Pray come into the house, and I’ll bring you wine and oat-cakes, for you must be tired and hungry after your ride. Use the house and us freely, we are all in your debt.” And she led the way with the conscious grace of a chatelaine. In three days, thought Cadfael, watching apart, she has grown accustomed to thinking of herself as the lady of the house; the habit can’t be shaken off in an instant.
Judith moved to follow, but Miles laid a hand earnestly on her arm to detain her for a moment. “Judith,” he said in her ear, with anxious solicitude, “have you made her any promises? The nun? You haven’t let her persuade you to take the veil?”
“Are you so set against the cloistered life for me?” she asked, studying his face indulgently.
“Not if that’s what you want, but?Why did you run to her, unless
? You haven’t promised yourself to her?”
“No,” she said, “I’ve made no promises.”
“But you did go to her?well!” he said, and shrugged off his own solemnity. “It’s for you to do whatever you truly want. Come, let’s go in!” And he turned from her briskly to call one of the weavers to take charge of the miller and the mules, and see both well cared for, and to shoo the spinners back to their spindles, but with good humour. “Brother, come in with us and most welcome. Do they know, then, at the abbey? That Judith’s home again?”
“Yes,” said Cadfael,”they know. I’m here to take back some gift Sister Magdalen has brought for our Lady Chapel. And I have an errand to the castle on Mistress Perle’s behalf.”
Miles snapped his fingers, abruptly grave again. “By God, yes! The sheriff can call off this hunt now, the quest’s over. But ?Judith, I’d forgotten! There must be things here you don’t yet know. Martin Bellecote is here, and his boy helping him. Don’t go into the small chamber, they are coffining Bertred. He drowned in the Severn, two nights ago. I wish I had not to spoil this day with such ill news!”
“I have already been told,” said Judith levelly. “Brother Cadfael would not let me return here unprepared. An accident, I hear.” There was that in the sparsity of the words and the bleakness of her voice that caused Cadfael to check and look at her closely. She shared his own trouble. She found it almost impossible to accept that anything that had happened in connection with her person and her affairs during these June days was merely accidental.
“I am going now to find Hugh Beringar,” said Cadfael, and withdrew from them on the threshold to turn back into the street.
In Judith’s own private chamber they sat down together in sombre conference, Hugh, Sister Magdalen, Judith and Cadfael, greetings over, in mildly constrained formality. Miles had hovered, unwilling to be parted from the cousin he had regained, but with a respectful eye upon Hugh, half expecting to be dismissed, but with a protective hand on Judith’s shoulder, as if she might need defending. But it was Judith who sent him away. She did it with a sudden flush of family tenderness, looking up into his face with a faint, affectionate smile. “No, leave us, Miles, we shall have time later to talk as much as you wish, and you shall know whatever you need to ask, but now I would rather be without distractions. The lord sheriffs time is of value, and I owe him all my attention, after the great trouble I have caused him.”
Even then he hesitated, frowning, but then he closed his hand warmly on hers. “Don’t vanish again!” he said, and went light-footed out of the room, closing the door firmly behind him.
“The first and most urgent thing I have to tell you,” said Judith then, looking Hugh in the face, “I didn’t want him or my aunt to hear. They have been through enough anxiety for me, no need for them to know that I’ve been in danger of my life. My lord, there are footpads in the forest not a full mile from Godric’s Ford, preying on travellers by night. I was attacked there. One man at least, I cannot answer for more, though commonly they hunt in pairs, I believe. He had a knife. I have only a scratch on my arm to show for it, but he meant to kill. The next wayfarer may
