Dark Night Hidden

9

The Abbess asked, as he might have known she would, ‘How can you be so sure, Sir Josse?

‘Because of what he was threatening to do to the wife of the Lord of the High Weald!’ he cried. ‘I told you, my lady, he was going to have her flogged, for no better reason than that she was of another faith and, in Father Micah’s eyes, living outside holy matrimony.’

‘And what has that to do with a foreign woman brought here to us for succour?’ Her grey eyes on his were cool to the point of chilliness, as if she thought he were making wild assumptions and did not approve.

‘Well, he could have met the woman and the rest of her group on the road. Perhaps he got into conversation with them, as travellers do, and they told him they weren’t Christians and he — the Father — thought, if they’re not Christians then they’re not really married, so I’ll flog the woman and brand her for her sins.’

The Abbess was not even trying to disguise her scepticism. He didn’t blame her; it sounded pretty feeble an explanation, even to him. ‘On the other hand, perhaps not,’ he finished lamely.

She smiled at him. ‘It is important always to set up a hypothesis, Sir Josse,’ she said kindly. ‘From sometimes wild ideas, a kernel of truth may emerge.’

Ah, he thought, but she’s a generous woman.

‘May I speak?’ Sister Caliste asked.

The Abbess turned to her. ‘Of course.’

‘Sister Euphemia says that once before she saw a woman branded. It was with an A because she had been the lover of a married man.’ The young nun glanced at Josse. ‘So perhaps there’s something in what Sir Josse says.’ She dropped her head, as if ashamed to support a scenario that her Abbess had just dismissed.

Josse watched the Abbess. After a short pause, she said, ‘Thank you, Sister Caliste. Perhaps, then, we should conclude that the woman in the infirmary-’

‘Her name is Aurelia,’ put in Sister Caliste.

‘-that Aurelia may indeed have suffered the wrath of Father Micah, but for some other reason and not because she came across him in the course of her journey and impulsively confessed to being of an alien faith. Yes?’ She looked first at Josse and then at Sister Caliste who, after giving each other a swift glance, both nodded their agreement.

The Abbess muttered under her breath — it sounded to Josse something about hair-splitting details — and then, with a radiant smile that indicated, to he who knew her so well, that she was having trouble holding on to her patience and didn’t want them to realise, said, ‘In that case, let us propose that.’

‘Where, then?’ Sister Caliste asked timidly after a moment.

‘Where?’ The Abbess glared at her.

‘Where did Father Micah meet Aurelia? And how did he find out she was an adulteress and had to be punished?’

Josse suppressed a smile. They were fair questions, and he was sure the Abbess would think so too, were she not so irritated. He was equally sure that she would not have an answer to either; he certainly could not think of one.

‘We cannot possibly expect to know these things at present,’ she said majestically. ‘There is a great deal more that we must find out before we understand what has happened. Sir Josse!’

She had turned to him so quickly that he was unprepared. Wiping the amusement from his face, he said, ‘My lady?’

‘If indeed this was a Church matter, and the punishment was meted out on Father Micah’s orders, then it is highly likely that Father Gilbert knows something of the matter.’ Glancing at Sister Caliste, she went on, ‘If Sister Caliste is right in her suspicion that this Benedetto was bodyguard to a group of travellers, then there may be news of the others. I had intended to visit Father Gilbert in any case, and I propose to do so straight away. Sufficient daylight remains, I would judge, to ride to his house and back before night closes in.’ She hesitated for an instant, then said, quite meekly for her, ‘I should be grateful for your company, if you would consent to ride with me.’

Now he smiled openly, pleased that she had asked. ‘Aye, that I will, and gladly.’

They set out from Hawkenlye riding silently side by side. Josse was glad of the chance to give Horace some exercise. The Abbess rode a dainty pale chestnut mare, an elegant animal whose breeding was evident in her lines. Josse, after the first quick glance, had looked away and tried to think about something else.

The mare was called Honey, and she belonged to a young woman called Joanna de Courtenay. Josse had encountered Joanna when she was on the run from her cousin, who had a future mapped out for Joanna’s young son that his mother found intolerable. Joanna had sought refuge with Mag Hobson, a woman who had cared for her when she was a child, then living in the depths of the forest and earning a reputation as a wise woman. Mag was now dead and Joanna, or so they said, lived out there in the wise woman’s hut. Some also said that she was taking up old Mag’s work.

Joanna had left her beautiful horse at Hawkenlye Abbey where, in exchange for the mare’s keep, the nuns were permitted to use her when they needed to. As, today, the Abbess was doing. Josse had loved Joanna, and he was not entirely sure but thought possibly he still did.

Which made it painful to see the Abbess riding Joanna’s horse.

He wanted very much to speak to her of Joanna. But, despite their closeness, Joanna remained one subject that was never discussed between them.

Perhaps it was just as well.

Breaking into his poignant thoughts, the Abbess suddenly said, ‘I forgot to tell you, Sir Josse, in the flurry of everything else that has happened today, but yesterday I had a visit from one Gervase de Gifford, who describes himself as Sheriff and who is apparently a de Clare man.’

‘Oh?’ Quite relieved to be jerked out of his reverie, Josse said, ‘What happened to Harry Pelham?’

‘That’s what I asked. De Gifford did not really answer, save to imply that Pelham had been promoted above his capabilities.’

‘We already knew that.’

‘Quite.’

‘What did he want?’ Josse was intrigued.

‘He said he had come because of Father Micah. He intends to visit again so that he can speak to you.’

‘To be told what I have discovered.’

‘Yes, that’s right.’

Josse snorted. ‘The answer to that is nothing. Nothing that was not known from the first.’

‘Come, Sir Josse!’ she encouraged him. ‘You have a strong instinct that Father Micah was somehow involved in the punishment of that poor woman in the infirmary!’

‘Instinct, my lady! You use the word well, for there is no proof of the Father’s hand in that.’

‘But what of the Lord of the High Weald’s tale?’ She seemed quite determined to rid him of his pessimism. ‘It is surely more than coincidence that you hear of a priest’s threat to a woman he believes to be a sinner and the very next day you come across a woman who has been punished in exactly the way that was described.’

She was right, he supposed. But, all the same, it was not something he would have liked to put before this de Gifford. ‘When does he intend to return?’ he asked.

‘He did not say.’

‘Well, I’ll just have to make sure I have something more definite to report when he does.’ Filled with purpose, he gave the ambling Horace a kick and said, ‘Come on! Let’s get on to Father Gilbert and see what he has to tell us!’

He thought he saw her smile briefly. Satisfaction at an end achieved? It looked remarkably like it.

Inside the priest’s house, Josse noticed immediately that the temperature was considerably warmer than on his previous visit. There was a large stack of neatly split logs piled up a safe distance from the hearth and Father Gilbert, sitting up in bed and looking quite perky, was now covered with a thick, handsome fur rug and had consequently shed a few layers of clothing.

‘My lady Abbess!’ he cried as she preceded Josse into the little room. ‘And Sir Josse! What a pleasure to see you both.’

‘You’ve had another visitor,’ Josse said, pointing to the logs and to the rug. ‘One who, I would say, spent some time with you.’

‘Yes indeed. Lord Saxonbury’s son Morcar arrived this morning saying that he had heard I was in need of firewood. He also brought me this splendid fur, a dish of stew, which he heated up for me on the trivet, and a jug of ale.’

No wonder, Josse though, the priest’s pale face was flooded with colour.

‘Those were kindly deeds,’ the Abbess was saying. ‘They are good, Christian people up at Saxonbury, then, Father?’

‘Christian, perhaps. Good, undoubtedly,’ Father Gilbert said.

‘You know about his wife, I believe?’ Josse asked. ‘When I was last here you said something about the woman whom Father Micah referred to as the Lord’s mistress.’

‘Yes, yes, I know.’ Father Gilbert’s hands were fretting with his blankets, tangled beneath the fur rug. ‘Father Micah did not recognise any marriage to be lawful in the eyes of God other than one conducted by a priest. A priest of the Christian faith,’ he added firmly. ‘Since the Lord’s wife is a Muslim woman and their marriage was celebrated in her faith, Father Micah considered them to be fornicators.’

‘He was planning to flog her,’ Josse said neutrally.

Father Gilbert’s alcoholic flush faded. ‘Was he?’ he whispered.

‘Aye.’

Josse and the Abbess stood side by side looking down at the priest in his bed. After a moment, Father Gilbert broke the accusatory silence.

‘He would have been within his rights,’ he said. ‘The Church says that-’

‘That an elderly, frail woman can be dragged from her sickbed and whipped?’ Josse interrupted. He felt the Abbess’s cautionary touch on his sleeve but ignored it. ‘The Lord asked me, Father, what I would have done had it been my mother about to be flogged.’

Father Gilbert looked miserable. ‘I understand your emotion, Sir Josse. Father Micah was — that is, sometimes he-’ He shrugged. ‘We each serve God in our own way,’ he finished weakly.

‘Father, may I ask a question?’ the Abbess said, respect in her tone.

He turned gratefully to her. ‘Of course, my lady.’

‘Do you think that Father Micah was capable of flogging someone? Of, say, giving a delicate, slender woman twenty-five lashes?’

There was a long pause while the priest considered the question. It appeared to Josse that he was struggling with whether to save his late fellow-priest’s reputation or to tell the truth. Finally he said, so quietly that Josse barely heard, ‘Yes. I know he was. I know he did.’

The Abbess said, ‘We have such a woman in our care at Hawkenlye. Was she, do you think, Father Micah’s victim?’

Father Gilbert raised moist eyes to her. ‘I cannot say, my lady, but I fear it may be so.’

‘In God’s merciful name,’ Josse burst out, ‘what had she done? She’s also got a brand on her brow, Father, which looks like the letter A. Was she another woman whose marriage Father Micah refused to recognise, who slept with a man without the Church’s sanction?’

Father Gilbert rubbed at his eyes with his hands. ‘Father Micah believed he was doing God’s work by such means,’ he said wearily. ‘Sinners are doomed to the eternal fires, Sir Josse.’ He removed his hands and stared fiercely up at Josse, the priest taking over from the guilt-ridden, compassionate man. ‘Do not forget that! Is it not better to suffer a little temporary pain here on Earth while the sin is burned away than to be condemned to damnation for the rest of time?’

‘A little temporary pain!’ Josse began, his voice strident with anger.

But the Abbess had hold of his sleeve again. More firmly now; her fist was clenched in the fabric like an iron clamp. She pulled him back towards the door. ‘Sir Josse will wait for me outside,’ she announced. Turning to him, he saw understanding in her eyes; she said under her breath, ‘He is sick and in pain, Sir Josse. Do not shout at him because of something that is not his fault.’

‘But-’

‘Josse!’

Not for nothing was she Abbess of one of the largest communities in the south of England; the habit of command was strong in her, and meekly he did as she ordered.

Outside, the icy air hit him as if someone had thrown a bucket of cold water over him. As his fast breathing slowed and grew quiet, he strained to hear what was being said within. But, except for the low, soothing tones of the Abbess and the occasional deeper rumble of the priest’s interjections, he could hear nothing.

After some time she came out, carefully fastening the door behind her. Immediately she came to stand beside him and said, ‘Sir Josse, forgive me for ordering you from the room. I have no more right to command you than you to command me. But I did genuinely fear for him, in pain as he is, and in addition I thought that perhaps he would speak more openly to me.’

He acknowledged her apology with a grunt. ‘And did he?’

‘Not really.’ She kicked at a stone frozen into the path. ‘One thing, though, that may be of use to us — he said that Father Micah had been gravely preoccupied of late with the problem of how to bring some souls back to the faith. He-’

‘Brother Firmin!’ Josse exclaimed. ‘He said that Father Micah mentioned two missions he had to pursue: one concerned a lord who had forgotten God’s ways, which, we can be fairly sure, meant the Lord Saxonbury. The other involved some lost souls who were destined for burning in the flames.’

‘Lost souls,’ she repeated dreamily. Then, eyes wide, ‘Sir Josse, what a frightful, haunting description! Oh, whatever it took, was not Father Micah right to try to bring the lost back into the love of God?’

‘My lady, think of that poor woman in the infirmary! Was that right, what he did to her?’

‘We cannot know that it was he!’

He smacked his hand against his forehead in exasperation. ‘You are thinking with your heart, not your head!’ he exclaimed. ‘First you suggest that Father Micah was right to flog a woman twenty-five times, then you say, oh, but it might not have been him! Do you approve or not, my lady?’

She kicked the stone again, more forcefully this time so that it was dislodged and rolled away. Following it, she kicked it again. Then she said quietly, ‘No.’

He knew better than to react in any way that might smack of triumph. Instead he said, ‘It’s time we were heading back. I’ll fetch the horses.’

He saw her back to her room and there bade her goodnight; it would soon be time for Vespers and he did not expect to see her again that day. As he turned to go, she said, ‘Sir Josse?’

‘My lady?’

‘I think that I should send for Gervase de Gifford. It seems very likely that Father Micah was responsible for the flogging of the woman in the infirmary, even if he did not himself wield the whip. If that is so, and it is also correct that she had companions, then one of them had a reason to harm the Father. We should, I believe, share this information with de Gifford.’

‘Aye, I agree.’ He paused; he was reluctant to say what was on his mind.

‘What is it?’ she asked.

‘I was just thinking that what you just said equally applies to our large friend Benedetto. I wonder if we should at least question him?’

She nodded slowly. ‘Yes, I see. And perhaps find some way of confining him until de Gifford arrives? If Benedetto is innocent it will do no harm, and if guilty, we shall have restrained him so that he may face justice.’

Thinking that she seemed to be placing a great deal of trust in this de Gifford’s ability to know guilt from innocence, Josse said, ‘May I speak to him first before there is any question of confinement? It is merely that I do not like to think that we might send a man to trial who was guilty of nothing more than devotion to his mistress.’

‘And you have no proof of de Gifford’s efficiency as an official of the law,’ she added. ‘Yes, Sir Josse. Please, go and speak to Benedetto now. I will be guided by you as to whether or not we should then turn him over to de Gifford.’

‘Thank you, my lady. Shall I report to you after the office?’

‘Yes. Please do.’

But he was back before she had even set out for the Abbey church.

He went to the infirmary, expecting to find Benedetto sitting in vigil with the woman, Aurelia. He was not there; Sister Caliste, preoccupied with tending her patient, trying to dress the wound on her forehead while the semi-conscious Aurelia writhed and moaned in pain, said that she thought he might have gone off to pray for her. But Benedetto was not in the church, nor, when Josse ran down to check, in the shrine in the Vale. He was not in the pilgrims’ shelter, nor anywhere else in the Vale.

Racing now, feeling his heart pumping hard, Josse explored the entire Abbey. With the exception of the small leper house — which was a separate, isolated unit within the foundation and which nobody entered if they expected to leave again — he looked everywhere. He even searched the curtained cubicles of the nuns’ long dormitory. Apart from the simple beds and some small personal effects, nothing.

Unless Benedetto had made himself so small that he could creep into a tiny, hidden corner, which hardly seemed likely, then there was only one conclusion: he had gone.

Feeling as if he were the bringer of very bad news, Josse went to find the Abbess.