The Wicked Winter

Chapter Five

I lengthened my stride.

'God be with you, Brother Simeon,' I called. 'I think we are bound for the same destination.'

The friar slowed to a halt and turned to face me. For a moment puzzlement deepened the lines between his brows.

'We've met somewhere before,' he said, then the frown cleared. 'Bristol. That was it. You and your mother were at the High Cross. Afterwards, she provided me with an excellent meal.'

'My mother-in-law,' I corrected. I had by now caught up with him and we continued to walk together. 'You've been summoned to Cederwell Manor.'

His head came round sharply. 'And how do you know that?'

'Four days ago, quite by chance, I met two men who were searching for you on the orders of their mistress, Lady Cederwell. She had urgent need of you, they said. A miller and his wife, who'd kindly let me eat with them, directed them south, to Woodspring Priory.'

Simeon nodded. His steps were beginning to flag and he leaned heavily on his staff as though he could barely keep himself upright. He looked even frailer than he had done in Bristol, his face gaunter, his body thinner, his black Dominican robe and cloak more travel-stained and tattered.

Only his eyes burned with the same fanatical zeal, the driving force which gave him the will-power to carry on with his mission.

'I have indeed come from that direction. The men you speak of did not find me until I was nearing my destination, and I told them that first I had to fulfil my promise to Abbot Hunt of Saint Augustine's Abbey in Bristol, to preach to the prior and his canons.' He added darkly, 'It seems that morals have grown lax amongst the brothers, and it needed someone to warn them afresh of the terrors of hellfire and eternal damnation; of the peril to their immortal souls if they continued with their sinful ways; to remind them that, under secular law, such malpractices would condemn them to the fire.'

'But what of Lady Cederwell?' I prompted.

'I said that I would be with her as soon as possible. As you say, her need of me seemed to be so great that one of her messengers offered to take me up and carry me to Cederwell there and then. But, "God's work will not be hurried," I told him. "It must proceed at His pace and in His good time. I shall come to your mistress on my own two feet when He wills that I shall do so, but not before, even if it means that Lady Cederwell must wait a week or so." However, with the Almighty's help, my words had such a powerful effect upon the monks of Woodspring that I was able to leave them after only three days, and I set out before first light this morning in the certain knowledge that Father Prior would have no more trouble with them. I have been walking steadily ever since, stopping for neither meat nor drink.'

In that case, I reflected, it was small wonder that he appeared to be in the last stages of exhaustion, for he had now been nearly eight hours on the road without food or rest. He must have passed Lynom Hall only a short while before I quit it, and for most of the way been less than a half-mile ahead of me. I could have caught up with him sooner had he tired more quickly or had I not stopped to speak to Ulnoth. I was sorry, for even his company would have been a welcome relief from the tedium of a winter journey, when there were so few fellow travellers to be met with.

I offered him my arm, saying, 'We can at least walk the last half-furlong together.'

But he spurned my proffered support.

'God will provide all the strength I need, Chapman. When that fails me, I shall know the time has come to prepare for death.'

His words made me remember Ulnoth.

'Do you recall passing a boulder house, some mile and a half back, just after you turned westwards from the Woodspring track?'

Friar Simeon shook his head. 'I look neither to left nor right when I am walking, but keep my eyes fixed on the road ahead, towards that place where God has called me next. Why do you ask? What significance does this boulder house have? Is there a lost soul there who is in need of my ministrations?'

'No, no!' I exclaimed hastily as the friar paused, ready to retrace his steps if necessary.

As we descended the last few yards to Cederwell Manor, I explained as well as I could my connection with Ulnoth and what he had said to me during our second brief meeting this afternoon. But Friar Simeon made nothing of it, merely hunching his thin shoulders.

'We are all of us concerned with thoughts of death, Chapman. Or we ought to be if we are wise. For the one thing we can be sure of from the cradle onwards is that we shall die, and we must see to it that we are always in a state of spiritual grace, ready to meet our Maker.'

Threading our way between two or three of the outbuildings, we found ourselves at last in full view of Cederwell Manor. This was of somewhat curious construction, with what I later discovered to be the great hall and, behind it, the servants' quarters, built at an angle to the entrance passage and kitchens. The barn stood opposite the main porch on the other side of a wide courtyard and a fish pond, and beyond that the land stretched, empty and desolate, towards the estuary. Only a few feet of ground separated the back of the house from the lee of the cliff which rose, steep and barren, behind it. A strange, remote spot, even, I guessed, in summer; a place in which there was plenty of time to brood on real or imagined wrongs and ills.

A little earlier it had stopped snowing, but suddenly it began again, more heavily than before, falling in sudden flurries from an iron-grey sky. The wind, too, had strengthened so that the air was a mass of dancing, whirling flakes, biting and stinging every exposed part of the body until the skin burned under their touch. Hurriedly I led the way round to the back of the house where, against the angled wall, a flight of stone steps led up to a narrow, slate-tiled gallery and two doors which opened into the second storey.

But it was the ground-floor room, whose shutters opened on to the cliff face and now stood wide in order to let out the steam and smells of cooking, which focused my attention. I rapped on one of the shutters as I passed the window, entering the door alongside and finding myself in the main passage which ran the whole length of the house. An archway immediately to my left led into the kitchen.

At first glance this seemed to be full of women, all arguing vehemently with one another. A stout body, whose shiny red face and greasy apron proclaimed her to be the cook, was standing, arms akimbo, confronting a younger, slenderer woman dressed in an unadorned grey woollen gown and a plain linen hood, yet whose general demeanour suggested that she was not one of the servants. As I made my appearance, the latter stamped a foot in frustration.

'When my sister-in-law is absent, you should take your orders from me,' she cried. 'I am next in command!'

'You! You're a nobody!' the cook retorted indignantly. 'A nothing! You're here on sufferance, through the master's bounty! I'm not obliged to do anything you tell me! Isn't that so, Mistress Talke?'

Thus appealed to, a third woman, probably as old as the cook but taller and of a sparer build, wearing a large bunch of household keys at her waist, raised her own voice to make herself heard above the others'.

'You're both wrong. I am the housekeeper and I am in charge when my lady is not here.' Her handsome, sallow-skinned features creased into an expression of contempt. 'And at every other time,' she added; a remark which her companions, now united against her, were too angry to heed.

'No one's in charge in my kitchen except me!' proclaimed the cook, picking up and brandishing a spoon.

The younger woman exclaimed, 'You're not family, Phillipa Talke, much as we know you'd like to be!'

'And what does that mean, my fine madam?' the housekeeper demanded, rounding on her furiously. Without however waiting for a reply, she continued, 'Martha Grindcobb is right. You have no place here but as a dependant of my lady. It would be as well if you remembered that.' The younger woman let out a high-pitched scream and thumped the kitchen table, making all the pots and pans standing on it rattle.

'My husband is my lady's brother! Perhaps it would also be as well if you remembered that!'

I felt Brother Simeon, who had followed me into the kitchen and was now pressed close against my shoulder, flinch at the sudden crescendo of noise. The next moment he pushed me aside and, striding forward, quelled the cacophony with a single word.

'Silence!'

He had not raised his voice, but his naturally penetrating tone commanded their immediate attention. All three women turned slowly in his direction, their quarrel momentarily forgotten, in mutual astonishment. The housekeeper's mouth flew open to demand an explanation of this intrusion, but when she saw the friar's habit and tonsured head her protestation faltered. The younger woman, however, she whom I understood to be the sister-by-marriage of Lady Cederwell, was not so reticent.

'And who might you be, Brother?'

'I am Friar Simeon,' he announced majestically, drawing himself up to his impressive height, the blue eyes flashing with the promise of hellfire and brimstone for anyone who was foolhardy enough to challenge his authority. 'I have been sent for by Lady Cederwell. Where is she?'

The housekeeper, recovering her nerve a little, said, 'My lady's in her private chapel in the tower, fasting and praying, where she has been since daybreak.' Her glance went past the friar to me. 'Who is this you've brought with you?' I took my pack from my back, dropping it on to the kitchen table, and spoke cheerfully in an attempt to lighten the general atmosphere.

'Oh, I'm nothing to do with Brother Simeon. We met by chance on the road and just happened to arrive together. I'm a chapman, trying to make some extra money in this bleak mid-winter.'

A little kitchen-maid, whom I had not previously noticed, crept from the comer where she had been quietly observing the antics of her elders, her eyes round with anticipation of possible, unlooked-for delights.

'Got any pretty ribbons, Chapman?' she asked in a husky whisper.

'I may have one or two,' I answered, 'that will suit a pretty girl like you.'

She giggled, then self-consciously put up a hand to touch her face which was afflicted with the weeping pustules of youth.

'Go on with you!' She giggled again.

Brother Simeon rapped his knuckles on the table.

'Enough of this!' he exclaimed harshly. 'Things temporal are of no importance when God's work is waiting to be done.

As for you, my child — ' he glared fiercely at the little kitchenmaid '- you would do well to contemplate the state of your immortal soul rather than consider ways of adorning your body.' He turned to the housekeeper. 'You may send to inform Lady Cederwell that I am here.'

Phillipa Talke hesitated, unwilling to disoblige a holy man, but even more afraid of defying her mistress's orders.

'You must seek her out for yourself, Father,' she answered, but with a hint of apology in her voice. 'When Lady Cederwell is at her devotions no one is allowed to disturb her. Anyone who did so would be severely punished. You, however, would suffer no such fate.'

Friar Simeon inclined his head.

'Your mistress sounds as if she is a woman after my own heart. What a truly fortunate lot yours must be — ' he included all those present, except myself, in a comprehensive sweep of his arm '- to be in the employ of such a one.' He did not appear to notice the lack of enthusiasm and almost audible murmur of disagreement which his statement provoked, but continued, 'Where may I find your mistress?' The youngest of the women, if you discounted the kitchenmaid, which it was easy enough to do, now stepped forward, determined to establish her superiority over the others.

'I,' she announced grandly, 'am Adela Empryngham, the wife of Lady Cederwell's brother. Of course it goes without saying that I should not be punished were I to show you the way, but,' she added hurriedly, 'it is snowing again and I suffer from delicate health, so you will understand, Brother, why I cannot accompany you. You will find Jeanette in the tower which you may have noticed as you arrived on manor lands. It stands clear of the outbuildings, south-west by about the length of a furrow.'

I thought her estimate of the distance over-generous, but was willing to concede that my own first glimpse of the tower had been a cursory one, and it might well be further off than I had imagined. I had no time to pursue the thought, however, for at that moment there was an interruption. A man who could only be Sir Hugh Cederwell strode into the kitchen.

He had seen, I guessed, some forty or more summers, a handsome, florid man with brown eyes and an abundance of dark brown hair which clustered in thick waves and curls across the nape of his neck and around his ears, but which was starting to thin a little on the crown. He was heavily built, barrel-chested, but not short of stature due to long, tapering flanks and a surprising length of leg from knee to ankle. The whole effect was one of power but with a curious top-heaviness. His voice, when he spoke, was deep and resonant.

'What is going on here? Why all the noise? Where's Lady Cederwell?' He caught sight of the friar and myself. 'Who are these people?'

It was my companion who answered, silencing the women with an upraised hand.

'I am Brother Simeon of the Dominican Order, and I have been summoned here by your wife, for what reason I have yet to discover. I demand to be allowed to speak to her forthwith.'

The knight's forehead puckered. 'Brother Simeon? The same friar who has been preaching hell and damnation in these parts for the past two weeks?' When Simeon nodded, I thought I saw a sudden apprehension flicker at the back of the dark brown eyes, but it was too momentary for me to be certain. Sir Hugh gave a blustering laugh and continued, 'I might have guessed that my wife would wish to meet a man with such a pious reputation. She is a very devout woman.' The last words were spoken with what could have been a sneer. The friar certainly chose to imerpret it as such, and iris eyes sparked with fury.

'Never mock at the godly, Sir Hugh! It would be as well for you if all the females of your household were to follow the example of your lady. Our acquaintance has been brief, but they seem to me to be a pack of gibbering fools, concerned only with the material things of this world; with which one of them is of greater earthly importance than her sisters.' He rounded with such ferocity on the women that they drew back from him, huddling together in a frightened little group. 'You stupid creatures! As Our Lord reminds us in the Holy Scriptures, your soul may be required of any one of you this very night! What will it matter then, when the pit of hell yawns at your feet, who is in charge in this kitchen? What will it profit you?'

Sir Hugh interrupted without compunction. 'Are you sure Lady Cederwell sent for you, Brother? I have no knowledge of her doing so. Does she know you? Have you met?' The friar's lips thinned until they were almost invisible and he sucked in a rasping breath.

'No, she knows me only by reputation, but that is sufficient. Do you dare to suggest that I am lying? I, Simeon?' His thin chest swelled. 'However, I have a witness. The pedlar here can vouch for the veracity of my words. Tell him, Chapman!'

So I told Sir Hugh of my meeting with the two men at the mill, and confirmed that they had indeed been searching for the friar on the orders of Lady Cederwell. The knight looked grim.

'Can you describe them to me'?'

I did my best, which proved to be good enough, for both he and Mistress Talke said in unison, 'Jude and Nicholas.' Sir Hugh added bitterly, 'Of course! Her own men, brought with her from Campden.'

Adela Empryngham nodded in confirmation. 'My father-in-law's people were always noted for their loyalty to him.

Once he was dead, they transferred that loyalty to Jeanette and Gerard.'

Sir Hugh snorted derisively. 'I should take care how you link Jeanette's and Gerard's names, my dear Adela. I doubt that either Jude or Nicholas feel much loyalty towards a bastard.'

The silence which followed this last remark was broken by a snigger from the cook, Martha Grindcobb. Mistress Empryngham coloured painfully, her bosom heaving with anger and indignation.

'I always knew it was a mistake for us to come here with Jeanette,' she shrilled breathlessly, as soon as she could trust herself to speak. 'I've always known how you regard us; as poor dependants, with every penny grudged that's spent on our food and clothing. Many and many a time I have told Gerard that he should leave here and stand on his own two feet, so that we should not have to be beholden to you.' Sir Hugh lifted his lip.

'And what did Master Gerard say in reply?' Again the colour suffused Adela Empryngham's face.

'He won't go,' she mumbled. Then she added with greater spirit, 'He feels it necessary to remain with his sister…'

'His half-sister!' Sir Hugh cut in, but she ignored him.

'… knowing how unhappy she is.'

Sir Hugh laughed, but there was no mirth in the sound.

'Jeanette has always been unhappy and always will be. She is as God made her, and He made her, seemingly, to be one of the most miserable of His creatures.' He shrugged. 'How can it be otherwise when she spends three-quarters of her waking life upon her knees and the other quarter sniffing out the wrongdoings, real or imagined, of her fellows? However, I am delighted to know, Adela, that you at least have enough sense to see that Gerard would be best away from here, instead of battening on my goodwill. There's plenty of honest work to be had if he looks for it. Persuade him to return to the Cotswolds. Sheep country, where wealth abounds. There are any number of rich sheepmen who would offer him employment.'

Friar Simeon intervened. '

'Am I to be kept waiting here all day? I wish to be conducted to Lady Cederwell immediately.'

Sir Hugh answered indifferently, repeating what we had already been told, 'You will find her in the old Saxon tower, which you can see well enough if you cross the courtyard and go out by the little gate. It stands some way distant from the manor, on the mudflats of the estuary, and is her own domain. She has made it hers in the five and a half years since she first came here, turning the uppermost storey into a chapel, even though there is one here, in the house.' He went on, as if struck by a sudden thought, 'Our chaplain is sick at the moment. He has been for more than a week and is therefore unable to carry out his duties at present. Perhaps that's why my wife has sent for you, Friar. She is in constant fear for her immortal soul. She must confess her sins and be granted absolution every day or she cannot sleep at night.'

'A truly godly woman,' breathed Simeon. 'A shining example to us all. Her like is to be treasured, Sir Hugh, not held up to ridicule. Now, with your leave, I shall go to her and discover what it is she wants of me.'

His tone implied that he would do so with or without our reluctant host's permission, and I was not surprised to see Sir Hugh's grimace of resignation.

' You must do as you wish, Brother. I will call one of the men to show you the way.'

'There is no need to trouble anyone.' The friar drew his cloak more tightly about his emaciated frame. 'I can follow your directions well enough.'

'I'll come with you,' I volunteered. 'In this weather the ground can be treacherous. This time, you might be glad of my arm in support.'

Simeon made no response as he turned and left the kitchen, but as he did not positively say me nay, I dropped my pack by the table and followed him, also wrapping myself in my cloak.

It was beginning by now to grow dark. The early January dusk was closing in, the sky black and louring, showing few rifts of light in the low-scudding clouds. It was still snowing, faster than it had been and rapidly covering the ground with a carpet of white. Simeon and I crossed the courtyard, skirting the fish pond and making for the barn and attendant outhouses which formed the southern boundary of the manor. Between the laundry and the dairy was a narrow gate, set into the short stretch of wall which connected the two buildings. It was not yet locked and swung outwards on its hinges at the first touch of the friar's hand.

The open country beyond it was also covered in snow, but I could feel the tough, coarse grasses, which are to be found in coastal regions, crunch beneath our feet. The cries of the seagulls, as they wheeled inland, scavenging for food, sounded mournfully in our ears. Even Friar Simeon shivered a little as we made our way towards the tower, but whether from cold or from a sense of the desolation of the place I was unable to guess.

Mistress Empryngham had been right: the tower stood clear of the manor by very nearly the length of a furrow. As we approached, I could see that it was in a state of disrepair, some of the stones chipped and crumbling. Efforts had been made, however, particularly about the first and second storeys, to renew the mortar and render the building sound enough for habitation. Facing us was a door, and as we drew close, I saw that it was slightly ajar, a drift of snow already covering the floor immediately inside it.

I turned my head and glanced questioningly at the friar, but his steady pace did not falter. He strode ahead of me, pushed the door wide and entered the tower.