The Paths of the Air

Two

They could not comfort Ella. When they discovered the stranger had gone, at first she kept her silence. But it was clear something was gravely wrong, for she bit her lips and frowned, muttering to herself under her breath, and she jumped at the slightest noise. Eventually she burst into tears, threw herself into the meagre comfort of Will’s scrawny arms and confessed what she had done.

Will decided to put the matter before his master.

‘Ella reckons she knows summat about the foreign fellow’s disappearance,’ he said to Josse, apprehending him on his way to the stables and firmly clasping Ella’s hand in case she decided to cut and run. ‘She says he’d gone from the outbuilding last night and his bed hadn’t been slept in.’ He turned to Ella. ‘That’s right, isn’t it?’ He gave her a shake, not ungentle. ‘Go on,’ he added in exasperation as her face crumpled, ‘Master won’t bite!’

‘Ella?’ Josse said, surprised. ‘Is this true?’ What on earth had she been doing out there in the darkness?

Ella raised her eyes to meet Josse’s. She nodded. Then, encouraged by his smile, she burst out, ‘I reckoned he were a spirit of the night, see. One of those shades that sleeps all day because they’re out a-haunting through the hours of darkness, and I just wanted to find out if what I feared was true because if so then we — then we-’ But, overcome, she pulled up her apron and buried her face in it, shoulders heaving.

Will, after a moment of staring at her in mystified incomprehension, put his arms round her thin body. ‘Come on, old girl,’ Josse heard him mutter.

But Ella seemed incapable of further explanation. With a shrug and a lift of the eyebrows in Josse’s direction, Will led her away.

He left Josse frowning and puzzling over the strange ways of women, in particular those such as Ella in whom the deep and unshakable superstition of the peasant was so strong. One of those creatures who haunted through the night and lay up all day? Well, that would explain John Damianos’s habit of sleeping the daylight hours away. And Josse realized there had been something slightly unearthly about the man… those unfathomable eyes, shadowed by the headdress so that it was impossible to determine colour or expression. His speech, sometimes just the few hesitant words of a man speaking an alien tongue and sometimes — very occasionally — fluent and grammatically accurate. And where had he come from? Josse had not gone beyond his initial assumption, that John Damianos was a native of Outremer brought to England by a returning crusader.

Why did I not ask him while I had the chance? Josse thought. Had I known his history, I could now be comforting Ella and telling her not to let her imagination run away with her, because our mysterious stranger was no more than a body servant from Acre brought home by Sir Somebody of Somewhere and released from his master’s service to find his own way home.

He wondered briefly whether to tell her this anyway; it would be a kind lie if it succeeded in removing her terrified anxiety. But he knew he was a poor liar, and if his brief explanation brought forth a torrent of questions he would soon be floundering.

No. Best to let Will take care of his woman. She’d soon forget all about John Damianos.

But she didn’t. Three days later, she was still afraid of her own shadow and she refused to go anywhere near the outbuilding. Since she had to pass it to get to the hen house, the root-vegetable store, the little shelter where Will stacked bundles of kindling and the earth privy, this meant life was becoming quite trying for everybody, especially Ella herself.

Summoning Will after overhearing yet another outburst of hysterical weeping, Josse asked wearily if there was any chance of Ella seeing sense.

‘None at all, sir,’ Will said bluntly. ‘Me, I’ve kept hoping the fellow would come back, then I’d have pinched him, punched him or snagged him with my knife to show her he was no spirit but felt pain and bled just like any other man.’ There was considerable vehemence in Will’s tone and Josse sympathized; it must be hell having to live cheek by jowl with a woman in Ella’s current mood, not to mention having to empty a daily bucket for her while she was incapable of using the yard privy. ‘But he’s gone,’ Will concluded. ‘Gone without a kiss my arse — er, gone without a word of thanks. We shan’t see him back here, sir, that’s my opinion.’

Josse had a suspicion that Will was right. He also suspected he knew just why John Damianos had vanished into the night: because he had seen Ella and knew his nocturnal habits were no longer a secret. If, that was, he had regularly gone out at night and the one occasion when Ella had gone looking had not been the exception.

‘I wonder,’ Josse said musingly.

Will voiced his indignation. ‘It’s not right, after we cared for him, just to vanish into the night. Is it, sir?’

‘No, Will.’ The odd thing was, Josse thought, that John Damianos had appeared better than to accept kindness and care without expressing his gratitude. The more he thought about it, the more it seemed likely that the stranger had intended to come back; that he would have returned before morning — just as in all probability he had regularly done — had it not been for Ella. With a flash of understanding, Josse realized that Ella must have worked this out too. A man had come to them for help and they had fed him, given him shelter and helped him recover his strength. The healing process was well under way but then through her own irrepressible curiosity, Ella had frightened him away.

What she was suffering from was not only superstitious terror but also a very human sense of guilt.

Poor Ella.

Josse waited another day and night, during which he prayed fervently that either John Damianos would return or Ella would come to her senses. Neither happened.

In the morning he went to the kitchen, stopped Ella’s weeping with an imperiously raised hand and announced, ‘Ella, you can’t go on like this.’ And nor can the rest of us, he might have added. ‘If there is nothing we can do to help you, we must take you to others who are skilled in such matters.’ Turning to Will, standing open-mouthed with the heel of an ageing loaf of bread in one hand and his knife in the other, Josse said, ‘Will, saddle Horace and prepare the mule and the smallest of the working horses. You and I are going to take Ella to Hawkenlye Abbey.’

The very act of riding out on the old mule in the clear morning air did a lot to restore Ella’s spirits. Twisting round to look at her, Josse observed that she was staring around with interested eyes as they rode along the track he knew so well. He realized that this was probably the furthest she had been in the years since she had come to the manor, and that must be… He did not know, for Will had been there in the days of the previous tenant and, for all Josse knew, so had she.

What a narrow world she inhabited.

They reached Hawkenlye Abbey in the early afternoon. Josse instructed Will to take the horses and the mule to Sister Martha in the stables. Taking Ella’s arm and giving her what he hoped was a reassuring smile, he led her across the wide courtyard.

He was very aware of her fear. As he opened the door and ushered her inside the infirmary, he tried to observe it with eyes that had never seen it before.

He saw a long room with windows set high in the walls. On either side were low beds, many of them occupied, and at each end were curtained-off recesses where treatments were carried out and where patients could be isolated. There were several nuns: all wore black habits, with white wimples that covered neck and throat and were drawn up around the face and across the brow. Some wore white veils and some black. Each wore a simple wooden cross around her neck. There must have been perhaps thirty-five or forty people yet the impression was of serenity. The nuns walked soft-footed, their pace unhurried so that they seemed to glide over the scrubbed flagstones. The patients — comforted, cared for, loved, perhaps — did not moan, cry out or complain, but instead lay passive and quiet, apparently well aware that the nuns were doing their best for them.

It was, thought Josse, a haven.

Beside him he sensed Ella relax. Then a big nun in a black veil, a crisp white apron tied over her habit, came towards him, a smile on her face and her arms open in welcome.

‘Sir Josse, how good to see you again so soon!’ she said, embracing him. ‘I am sure we can find some more leaves for you to sweep up!’

He returned her smile. ‘And right willingly I’ll do it,’ he said. ‘But I have come on a different mission. Sister Euphemia, this is Ella, who is in charge of my kitchen at New Winnowlands.’ Ella was staring up at the infirmarer, awestruck, and now she gave a bob curtsey. ‘Ella, Sister Euphemia here and her nursing nuns will be able to help you.’

‘What ails you, Ella?’ Sister Euphemia asked gently; she must, Josse noted, have picked up Ella’s fear and chronic shyness and she had turned from a large, confident and sometimes overbearing woman into a soft-spoken soul whose only wish was to soothe and to comfort.

To be able to change one’s very essence so swiftly and seamlessly was, he reflected, quite a talent.

‘Ella has-’ he began.

But with a smile Sister Euphemia shook her head. ‘Thank you, Sir Josse, but I would prefer it if she told me herself,’ she said.

Then, without a backward glance from either of them, the infirmarer and her shy companion walked away to one of the curtained recesses and disappeared from sight. Josse stared after them and wondered just what to do next.

He found Will waiting for him outside the infirmary.

‘Ella’s being cared for,’ Josse said. ‘By the infirmarer herself, who is very good at reassuring those who are disturbed. Don’t worry, Will, we’ll soon have our Ella back again and restored to her usual self.’ Will muttered something under his breath. ‘Go and get yourself something to eat,’ Josse ordered. ‘Over there — ’ he pointed — ‘you’ll find the refectory, and they serve food to those who ask. Tell them you’re with me,’ he added, unable to prevent the instant of pride.

Will suppressed a grin. ‘Right you are, sir,’ he said. Then, turning to go: ‘You’ll be off to see the lady Abbess, no doubt.’

‘I-’ But the protest never came. It was exactly where Josse was going.

Will’s smile was wider now. ‘See you later, sir.’ With what might well have been a wink, he turned and was gone.

Slowly Josse walked across the open space to the cloister, at the end of which Abbess Helewise had her little room. Tapping on the door, he heard her low ‘Come in’ and opened the door.

She looked as delighted to see him as she always did.

‘Sir Josse,’ she exclaimed, getting up and striding around her wide oak table, ‘you have come back! What can we do for you?’

‘It’s not me, it’s my servant Ella,’ he said hastily. ‘She’s given herself a bad fright and we just can’t get her out of her terror.’

‘How dreadful for her! What on earth happened?’

‘We had a stranger staying with us at New Winnowlands. He came to us asking for work, although he looked so sickly and weak that I didn’t reckon there was much he could have done. Anyway, we offered him an outbuilding to sleep in and we fed him up a bit.’ He was aware of her nod of approval and it warmed him. ‘It was odd, because for all he ate everything put before him, still he did not seem to grow any stronger. Instead of getting up in the mornings, he kept to his bed and slept for most of each day.’

‘What was the matter with him?’ asked the Abbess. ‘Oh, Sir Josse, it wasn’t some frightful sickness…?’

‘No, my lady, I am sure, for no sick man ever ate like our stranger.’

‘Go on,’ she commanded. ‘What happened to scare Ella so badly?’

‘She was intrigued as to why he slept all day,’ Josse explained, ‘and I guess she imagined he might be up to some secret nocturnal task. Anyway, she got up one night and went to see for herself and she discovered he wasn’t there.’

‘Did that not serve only to confirm her suspicions?’

‘So you’d have thought,’ Josse agreed ruefully, ‘but unfortunately she made up her mind that our stranger was some sort of malevolent spirit who hid from the light and emerged by night to do whatever such entities do.’

‘Had she any reason to believe the man was malevolent?’ asked the Abbess.

Josse shrugged. ‘If so, she has not revealed it.’

The Abbess was studying him closely. ‘Have you?’

Josse considered the question. ‘I don’t know,’ he said slowly. ‘He’s a mystery, that’s for sure — I’m pretty certain he’s been brought back from Outremer and abandoned, for he looks, acts and for the most part speaks like a foreigner. That’s really what prompted me to take him in, my lady — too many returning crusaders use a man they’ve engaged out East for as long as it pleases them, only to kick him out once they’re home with their own servants again.’

‘I see,’ she said. Then: ‘And this strange guest of yours has definitely gone?’

‘Aye. Vanished into the night, taking everything he owns with him.’

‘If it is indeed true that he is engaged upon some clandestine mission,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘then could it be that Ella’s sudden interest caused him to flee?’

‘Just what I thought,’ Josse agreed. ‘I visualized him on the point of setting out, then spotting Ella tiptoeing across the yard to spy on him. Fearful that she’d report back to me, he ran.’

‘Yet you say he took all his belongings with him,’ she pointed out. ‘Does that not suggest to you that he was planning to leave anyway, even before he saw Ella going out to check up on him?’

He rubbed a hand across his jaw. ‘Aye,’ he acknowledged gruffly. ‘Aye, it does.’

She smiled suddenly. ‘Sir Josse, does it matter? You did what you could for him, and it appears you helped him recover his strength. The important thing now is to make Ella see that her fears were unfounded; that this mystery man was no more than a stranger whom you took in and saw on his way. If we here at Hawkenlye can achieve that, we can call the matter closed.’ He did not answer. ‘Yes?’

He looked up and met her eyes. There was, he detected, the beginnings of amusement in her expression. ‘Suppose so,’ he muttered.

‘Excellent!’ she cried. ‘Now, you have had a long ride in the cold — let me order some refreshments.’

Ella remained closeted with the infirmarer for most of the afternoon and by the time she emerged — smiling shyly up at Will, who was waiting for her — it was too late to set out for New Winnowlands. Josse and Will were offered accommodation with the monks down in the Vale and one of the nursing nuns said she would prepare a shakedown bed for Ella in the infirmary.

In the morning Will was up early to ready the mounts. Josse, who had been enjoying a chat with Brother Augustus while he finished his breakfast, followed him a little later up to the Abbey to seek out Ella, who was making herself useful in the infirmary by helping Sister Caliste take food and drinks to the bed-bound patients.

Will brought out the horses and Josse went to say farewell to the Abbess. He, Will and Ella had already mounted up and were setting out through the gates when Josse heard the sound of hurrying hooves. He drew rein, waiting.

A horse and rider came into sight from the direction of the forest. The horse was pushed to its limits and, despite the chill morning air, sweating. The rider was white in the face and looked shocked and sick.

Josse slid off Horace’s back, handing the reins to Will. Stepping forward, he went to meet the rider as he pulled his horse to a skidding halt at the gates.

‘Is this Hawkenlye Abbey?’ the man shouted. He was young — little more than a boy — and the poor quality of his garments compared with the splendour of his horse suggested that the animal was not his usual mount.

Laying aside the instant suspicion that this lad might be a horse thief, Josse put a hand on the horse’s bridle and said, ‘Aye, this is Hawkenlye.’

‘Oh, thank God!’ The lad all but fell from the saddle, stumbled and would have collapsed but for Josse’s supporting arm. ‘It’s terrible! I’ve never seen anything so ghastly in all my born days, and that’s a fact!’ His eyes were wide with horror and Josse smelt vomit on his breath. ‘It fair turned my stomach and I don’t normally quake at the sight of blood.’ His pallor increased and Josse stepped back just in time as the lad threw up on the frosty grass.

A small crowd had gathered. Sister Martha, frowning and with her pitchfork in her hand, stood beside Ella, who was mounted on the mule; Brother Saul and Brother Augustus, who had come to see Josse’s party on their way, stepped forward. In the background the Abbess was walking slowly towards the source of the commotion, eyebrows raised.

Josse nodded at Augustus who, understanding, took charge of the lad’s horse. Then Josse put an arm around the shaking boy and said, ‘Let’s have it, then. You’ve seen something bad and you’ve come here for help?’

‘Yes. Yes,’ the lad stammered. ‘Me and the master, we’re riding along the track that skirts the forest on our way down to Tonbridge — Master, he’s a merchant and he had some goods he were taking to sell — and all of a sudden his horse starts and almost throws him. We could smell it ourselves then, both of us — the stench was like a butcher’s block, I’m telling you.’ He shuddered. ‘Anyway — ’ he rallied — ‘Master dismounts, goes to have a look and I follows. It — he — is lying there under the trees and there’s blood and spilled guts and he’s-’

But trying to describe the horror was beyond him. Dumbly shaking his head, the lad began to weep.

‘Your master told you to mount his horse and come on here for help?’ Josse suggested. ‘Is that what happened?’

‘Yes, sir, it were just like that,’ the boy said, turning pathetically grateful eyes on Josse. ‘Me, I ride a mule but he’s a lazy old bugger — sorry — and it takes all my strength to get him moving, let alone hurrying, so Master says to ride his horse.’ The lad glanced up at the horse, now being soothed by Brother Augustus. ‘He’s all in a sweat,’ the lad said. ‘Master’ll be cross.’ His face crumpled anew.

‘I’ll see to the horse,’ Augustus said kindly. He glanced at Josse, who nodded again, and then he led the horse away to Sister Martha’s stables.

The Abbess had now joined the group. ‘I don’t think this poor boy is capable of telling you any more,’ she murmured in Josse’s ear. ‘Would it perhaps be wise to get him to take you to where this accident occurred? Perhaps if you were to take Brother Saul and Brother Augustus, they could carry a hurdle on which to bring the unfortunate victim here to us?’

He turned to her. ‘Aye, my lady,’ he said quietly, ‘that was exactly what I had in mind.’

Sister Martha volunteered to take over the big sweating horse. Will took charge of Horace and his own and Ella’s mounts, following Sister Martha to the stables with Ella clutching on to his arm. Very soon Josse and the two lay brothers were ready to leave. The lad still seemed overawed by Josse and so Brother Augustus — much closer in size and age — quietly fell into step beside the boy. Josse and Brother Saul, walking behind, heard him say cheerfully, ‘They’re good people at the Abbey and you did well coming to us for help. I’m called Brother Augustus but my friends usually call me Gussie. What’s your name?’

The boy looked up with the very beginnings of a smile and said something — it sounded like ‘It’s Dickon’ — in reply. Then Gussie, exhibiting an unexpected gift for small talk, began to chatter about the weather, the quality of the food at the Abbey and just what a lay brother’s daily round consisted of and quite soon the lad was joining in and even giving the occasional chuckle.

Josse observed it all. He was grateful to Augustus for making the boy relax — people in shock weren’t much use for anything — but nevertheless he felt deeply disturbed.

He was lying there under the trees.

So much blood and spilled guts.

Glancing down at the hazel hurdle that the silent Brother Saul carried under one arm, he wondered if it would be a living man or a corpse that they bore back to the Abbey.

He thought more likely the latter.