The Prioress' Tale

Chapter 15

A shiver of possibility went up Alys’ spine. A miracle. A healing. Here in St. Frideswide’s. When word of it went out…

Dame Claire came in from the cloister, her box of medicines in her arms, and behind her was Aunt Eleanor with Margrete, and Lady Adela with a ewer and clean cloths, and behind her that girl Joice who was making so much trouble but being useful now, carrying a basin of steaming water.

Taking the matter in hand, Alys pointed them toward the altar. “He’s there. Dame Perpetua, go with them. Sister Thomasine, stay with me. Sister Amicia, you stay by the door and make certain no one else comes in.” Dame Claire and the others had surely been noticed crossing the cloister, and the curious would not be far behind them. Alys did not want the complication of them just yet, not until she had things thoroughly in hand here. She gave a sharp nod at the minstrel, letting her displeasure show, and said, “Dame Frevisse, see him out of the cloister and quickly.” And as an afterthought: “Sister Amicia, send someone for Father Henry.” Even if it were only Father Henry, it would not hurt to have a priest to testify to everything. Followed by Sister Thomasine, she followed the others to the altar to take over matters there, in time to hear Dame Perpetua exclaiming to them, “He’s not mad anymore! He talks now. Sister Thomasine…”

“Dame Perpetua!” Domina Alys snapped her short. “There’ll be time enough for that later.”

She knew the questions that would have to be asked and answered: How long had the fellow been possessed? Who was he? Who knew him? The more important the people who knew him, the better the miracle, and if this proved to be a great enough miracle-or, better, if more miracles followed it-she would have no more worry over the tower or anything else. There would be pilgrimages to here, and pilgrimages meant offerings, gifts, money enough for the tower, for its bells, for a gilded weathercock if she wanted it. Money enough for everything she meant St. Frideswide’s to have.

But for now she had to see to this miracle, such as he was, kneeling with one filthy shoulder leaned against the green damask altar cloth-probably dirtying it, but that did not matter now-one hand fisted into its hem, the other pressing a bloodied handkerchief to the side of his head while Dame Claire tried to gentle it away to come at the wound. Her box of medicines was set beside her and the girl Joice was near it, holding the basin of water and a soaked cloth ready for when Dame Claire would need it. Lady Adela hovered close behind them, but since she had set down the ewer and cloths beside Joice, she was not needed there, and Alys ordered, “Lady Adela, go to Lady Eleanor, out of the way.” At least Aunt Eleanor, Dame Perpetua, and Margrete had sense enough to stand aside. Or maybe it was just the smell that kept them at bay. Well, if they wanted the odor of sanctity about the man, they were going to have to wait for it.

But the child had not shifted and Alys turned a hard stare on her. “Lady Adela, don’t make me tell you twice.”

Lady Adela’s outthrust lower lip told she was about to be stubborn, but Dame Perpetua called, a little desperately, “Come here now, child. You’ve been told. You’ll be sent away altogether, you go on like this.”

Lady Adela shared an unfriendly look between her and Alys and ungracefully obeyed.

Putting the thought away for later that Lady Adela was someone else who was going to have to be dealt with and probably soon, Alys moved in close on Dame Claire, who had the man’s hand away from his head now and was beginning to wash the blood and dirt out of his matted hair so she could find where he was hurt.

“Keep him from bleeding on things if you can help it, Dame,” Alys said for the sake of saying something. Dame Claire gave no sign of hearing her but just now that did not matter. Let her see to the hurt. Alys would see to the rest. She drew back, away from his smell. It would be better when he had been cleaned. They could see more clearly what they had then. “Dame Perpetua, go find some kitchen folk to bring a tub of water from the laundry, large enough to wash him in. Hot water, mind you, and soap and towels and plenty more rags.”

Dame Perpetua momentarily stared at her, then exclaimed, “You’re going to have him washed here? In the church”] All else aside, it’s nearly time for Vespers!“

Alys had forgotten Vespers. Dame Perpetua was right, there would not be time to have the fellow scrubbed like he needed to be before Vespers. But neither did Alys mean to pray with the smell of him for company. Either Vespers would have to go elsewhere or he would.

But that did not excuse Dame Perpetua speaking out at her that way, and she said coldly, letting her displeasure show, “You forget your place, Dame. No, not in the church. In the warming room. Give order for the fire to be laid there while the water is being brought and then stay to oversee it all.”

Dame Perpetua flinched at the warning but still held back, seemingly unable to believe what she was being told, until Alys snapped, “Dame!” She flinched again at that, dropped hurriedly into a low curtsy, and fled, Alys calling after her, “When he’s clean and Vespers is over, I want him back here at the altar and no delay. You understand?”

“Yes, my lady,” Dame Perpetua called back, not slowing.

Good. Someone at least could learn their lessons.

Beside her, Aunt Eleanor asked mildly, “You mean to keep him in the church, then?”

From someone else that would have been too close to criticism, but Alys answered her readily with, “How much did Dame Perpetua manage to tell you about what happened?”

“Enough, I think. The man was lunatic and mute, and after Sister Thomasine spoke to him, he has his wits back.” Aunt Eleanor glanced toward the limp, dirty figure letting Dame Claire do what she wanted to him. “A little,” she amended. “Enough that he could speak and ask for prayers and go to the altar.”

“But you see the rest of it?” Alys asked. “It’s not going to matter anymore that all we’ve ever had here is one of St. Frideswide’s fingerbones! It’s never done aught for us anyway. What I have now is far better than it’s ever proved to be.” All of a saint’s power to bless and protect was supposed to be as present in the smallest part of her as in the whole, but Alys had never seen any particular good come from their tiny bit of bone. She looked aside to Sister Thomasine, standing where she had stopped after following Alys up the church. As always, she was simply there, head bowed, hands folded, so lost in prayers she hardly heard anything that happened around her. A thin little nothing of a nun, that’s what she looked like, but Alys had known what she was, had always known. She had thought Aunt Eleanor would realize it now, too, but her aunt’s expression was more blank than comprehending and Alys leaned close to whisper, just between them-it was not something servant or child needed to know yet: “She’s a saint. You see it? She spoke to a madman, and despite all the powers of the devil and demons inside him, he spoke back. He answered her and asked for prayers. He’s her first miracle and if she can do one miracle, she can do more.”

She drew back, to enjoy Aunt Eleanor’s wonder, but what there was of it was too slight, too questioning. “You really mean to keep him in the church, then?” she repeated.

“In the church. Here at the altar.” Alys was beginning to be impatient. She had expected her aunt to grasp it easily, even if no one else did. “It’s done in other places.” The sick-and most particularly the lunatic-were allowed to stay at the altar or the saint’s tomb through a night or even nights and days together while they prayed and were prayed for.

Aunt Eleanor nodded, understanding that at least, but then said slowly, “In the great pilgrimage churches, yes, it’s done.”

“And it can be done here!” Alys cried, forgetting to hold her voice down. That was exactly the point. Was she the only one who could see it? “This madman is the beginning for St. Frideswide’s and he’ll stay here at the altar for as long as it takes Sister Thomasine to pray him back to his full wits!”

Softly, without raising her head, Sister Thomasine murmured, “I won’t.”

Alys turned to stare at her, blank-minded with surprise, then jerked her wits back together. Aware that everyone else except the madman was staring, too, she demanded, “What do you mean, you won’t? You won’t what?”

“I won’t pray for him to be healed,” Sister Thomasine said as quietly, still without raising her head.

Anger began to overtake Alys’ disbelief. Her voice rising, she demanded, “You’re telling me you won’t pray for him?”

She had thought after the lesson she had given on Dame Frevisse this morning no one would dare to cross her for a long, long while to come. For it to be Sister Thomasine- Sister Thomasine…

“Alys,” Aunt Eleanor said, “she’s saying she won’t pray simply for him to be healed. She will pray for him. You will pray, won’t you, Sister Thomasine?”

Sister Thomasine raised her head and looked with clear, untroubled eyes, first at Aunt Eleanor and then at Alys. “Yes. Of course I’ll pray for him,” she said simply.

Relieved, shaken, fighting the trembling that was always the aftermath of her rages, Alys accepted that with relief. But why did people have to drive her into these angers to begin with?

From the altar, Dame Claire said, “I’ve cleaned enough of the blood and dirt away to see the wound isn’t much.”

Willing to be distracted, Alys turned away from Sister Thomasine to ask, “He’ll be all right?” Reynold’s men had better pray he was.

“I’ve an ointment for it, and if the wound is kept clean, he should do well enough.”

“We’ll keep it clean enough,” Alys promised grimly. “Is he hurt aught else?”

“He doesn’t seem to be.” Dame Claire set her hand under the man’s chin and tried to raise his head. He resisted but she forced him with, “Let me see you.” There had been only scrubbing enough yet to have the wound clean, but she had shoved his matted hair back while she did it, so that for the first time his face showed, and she made him look at her while she asked as impatiently as if he were just any patient resisting her help, “Do you hurt anywhere besides your head?”

“No,” he said hoarsely, pulled free, and tucked his head low again.

Dame Claire forced the cloth she had been using on him into his hand. “Wash your face then while I find the ointment.”

He tried to resist that, too, but she warned sternly, “There won’t be prayers for someone as ungodly filthy as you are. Wash.” Not straightening up, the man fumbled with the cloth and began to rub at his face, somewhat unpurposefully.

The girl Joice shifted away from Dame Claire to hold the basin where he could use it more readily. No, Alys saw she was doing more than simply that-she was kneeling so low she could look up into his face. And Alys felt the spur of another hope. The girl had proved to be nothing but stubborn since she had come, had shown small sign that Alys could see of warming to Benet at all. Now here she was, after hardly looking at Benet, all but worshiping this dirty lump of a man. What if it turned out it had not been Reynold’s doing at all that brought her here, but God’s? What if she was meant to be here for this miracle, to be changed by it, to choose not Benet but nunhood in St. Frideswide’s? If she had the dowry Reynold said she did and she chose to become a nun…

“Alys,” Aunt Eleanor said.

Alys turned to find one of the kitchen women standing a respectful distance off, wanting to be noticed.

“Yes?” Alys said impatiently.

“The bath is ready,” the woman said, making a quick curtsy with the words. “Dame Perpetua said to tell you.”

“Good. Stay. You can help see him there. Dame Claire?”

“Done for now,” Dame Claire said, just smearing ointment on the cut. “I’ll put more on when he’s been bathed, but this will serve until then.”

She stoppered the jar and put it back in her box of medicines while Alys advanced to the foot of the altar steps and ordered, “Fellow, look at me.”

He did, for what it might be worth. He was still vile to the eye and nose and had mostly only smeared the dirt with the little washing he had done, but at least he had responded to her, and with the loud encouragement she would have used on a dog she meant to grasp at least something of her meaning, she said at him, “You understand what you have to do now? You’re going to have a bath. You’re going to be cleaned so you can stay here in the church. They’re going to take you away for your bath and then bring you back and you’ll be fed and seen to and Sister Thomasine will pray for you. You understand that?”

She was nodding at him while she said it and he was nodding back, nod for nod, so there was hope he understood, and she gestured the kitchen woman forward, ordering, “Help him up. See him out. Go with him, Dame Claire. And send someone to see what’s keeping Father Henry.”

She drew back and left them to it. The kitchen woman came readily, probably curious enough by now from what she must have heard from Sister Amicia and Dame Perpetua not to mind the smell. Between them, she and Dame Claire helped the man to stand and brought him down the altar steps. As they passed her, Alys, drawing back, saw he was shivering and ordered, “See to it he’s better clothed before you bring him back here. A cloak or something.”

“Yes, my lady,” the kitchen woman answered, but Joice quickly set aside the basin and rose, sweeping off her yards-of-green wool cloak-Reynold had to have the right of it; her people must be wealthy-as she followed them down the steps. “Mistress Southgate,” Aunt Eleanor said, in a tone meant to warn her off, but Joice swung the cloak around the madman’s shoulders, filthy though they were, enveloping him. Frightened or wary, likely, he jerked as if to twist free of it, but Joice laid a hand on his back in reassurance and even dared to meet his startled eyes in a long look before she drew aside, leaving him to go on with Dame Claire and the other woman.

“Joice,” Aunt Eleanor said, calling the girl to her as Lady Adela went to take Joice’s hand, asking, “Couldn’t we go with him, too?”

“No,” Aunt Eleanor and Alys said together. What Joice would have said was cut off by the cloister bell beginning to ring to Vespers. Sister Thomasine immediately turned away toward her choir stall; and Aunt Eleanor, taking the bell for cue, came to take Lady Adela’s other hand, saying firmly, “What we’ll do is pray for him. That will do him the most good. Come along.”

Lady Adela’s lower lip went out in sign of coming stubbornness, but Joice said, “That would be good,” and held between them, Lady Adela submitted, going away down the nave with her and Aunt Eleanor, Margrete following, so that Alys was free to swing her attention toward the cloister door where the incoming nuns were making a confusion, more interested in having a look at the madman that clearing the way for him. Alys advanced on them, ready to give them both sides of her tongue and enough of her mind that after this they would think twice before having anything but prayers in their heads once the bell rang for an office. St. Frideswide’s had finally been blessed like it deserved, and by blessed St. Frideswide, they were going to start being worthy of it, like it or not.