“I’ll be gentle, humble, I’ll kneel to him, I’ll put my life in his hands. The infirmary—which is it? I never was inside these walls until now. Which door?” He caught Eliud by the arm and dragged him to the archway that looked out on the court. “Show me, quickly!”
“No! Don’t go! Leave him be! For shame, to rush in on his rest…”
“Which door?” Elis shook him fiercely. “You brought him, you saw!”
“There! The building drawn back to the precinct wall, to the right from the gatehouse. But don’t do it! Surely the girl knows her father best. Wait, don’t harry him now—an old, sick man!”
“You think I’d offer any hardihood to her father! All I want is to tell him my heart, and that I have her favour. If he curses me, I’ll bear it. But I must put it to the test. What chance shall I ever have again?” He made to pull clear, and Eliud held him convulsively, then as suddenly heaved a great sigh and loosed his hold.
“Go, then, try your fortune! I can’t keep you.” Elis was away, without the least caution or dissembling, out into the court and straight as an arrow across it to the door of the infirmary. Eliud stood in shadow to watch him vanish within, and leaned his forehead against the stone and waited with eyed closed some while before he looked again.
The abbot’s guests were just emerging from the doorway of his lodging. The young man who was now virtually sheriff set off with the lady and her daughter, to conduct them again to the porch of the to-do. Einon ab Ithel lingered in talk with the abbot, his two companions, having less English, waited civilly a pace aside. Very soon he would be ordering the saddling of the horses, and the ceremonious leave, taking.
From the doorway of the infirmary two figures emerged, Elis first, stiffly erect, and after him one of the brothers. At the head of the few stone steps the monk halted, and stood to watch Elis stalk away across the great court, taut with offence, quenched in despair, like our first forefather expelled from Eden.
“He’s sleeping,” he said, coming in crestfallen. “I couldn’t speak with him, the infirmarer turned me away.”
Barely half an hour now, and they would be on their way back to Montford, there to spend the first night of their journey into Wales. In the stables Eliud led out Einon’s tall bay, and saddled and bridled him, before turning his attention to the horse he himself had ridden, which now Elis must ride in his place, while he lingered here.
The brothers had roused themselves after their customary rest, and were astir about the court again, on their way to their allotted labours. Some days into March, there was already work to be done in field and garden, besides the craftsmen who had their workshops in cloister and scriptorium. Brother Cadfael, crossing at leisure towards the garden and the herbarium, was accosted suddenly by an Eliud evidently looking about him for a guide, and pleased to recognise a face he knew.
“Brother, if I may trouble you—I’ve been neglecting my duty, there’s something I had forgotten. My lord Einon left his cloak wrapping the lord Gilbert in the litter, for an extra covering. Of sheared sheepskins—you’ll have seen it? I must reclaim it, but I don’t want to disturb the lord Gilbert. If you will show me the place, and hand it forth to me…”
“Very willingly,” said Cadfael, and led the way briskly. He eyed the young man covertly as they walked together. That passionate, intense face was closed and sealed, but trouble showed in his eyes. He would always be carrying half the weight of that easy fosterbrother of his who went so light through the world. And a fresh parting imminent, after so brief a reunion; and that marriage waiting to make parting inevitable and lifelong. “You’ll know the place,” said Cadfael, “though not the room. He was deep asleep when we all left him. I hope he is still. Sleep in his own town, with his family by and his charge in good heart, is all he needs.”
“There was no mortal harm, then?” asked Eliud, low, voiced.
“None that time should not cure. And here we are. Come in with me. I remember the cloak. I saw Brother Edmund fold it aside on the chest.” The door of the narrow chamber had been left ajar, to avoid the noise of the iron latch, but it creaked on being opened far enough to admit entrance. Cadfael slipped through the opening sidewise, and paused to look attentively at the long, still figure in the bed, but it remained motionless and oblivious. The brazier made a small, smokeless eye of gold in the dimness within. Reassured, Cadfael crossed to the chest on which the clothes lay folded and gathered up the sheepskin cloak. Unquestionably it was the one Eliud sought, and yet even at this moment Cadfael was oddly aware that it did not answer exactly to his recollection of it, though he did not stop to try and identify what was changed about it. He had turned back to the door, where Eliud hovered half-in, half-out, peering anxiously, when the young man made a step aside to let him go first into the passage, and knocked over the stool that stood in the corner. It fell with a loud wooden clap and rolled. Eliud bent to arrest its flight and snatch it up from the tiled floor and Cadfael, waving a hand furiously at him for silence, whirled round to see if the noise had startled the sleeper awake.
Not a movement, not a sharp breath, not a sigh. The long body, scarcely lifting the bedclothes, lay still as before. Too still. Cadfael went close, and laid a hand to draw down the brychan that covered the grizzled beard and hid the mouth. The bluish eyelids in their sunken hollows stared up like carven eyes in a tomb sculpture. The lips were parted and drawn a little back from clenched teeth, as if in some constant and customary pain. The gaunt breast did not move at all. No noise could ever again disturb Gilbert Prestcote’s sleep.
“What is it?” whispered Eliud, creeping close to gaze.
Take this,” ordered Cadfael, thrusting the folded cloak into the boy’s hands. “Come with me to your lord and Hugh Beringar, and God grant the women are safe indoors.” He need not have been in immediate anxiety for the women, he saw as he emerged into the open court with Eliud mute and quivering at his heels. It was chilly out there, and this was men’s business now the civilities were properly attended to, and Lady Prestcote had made her farewells and withdrawn with Melicent into the to-do. The Welsh party were waiting with Hugh in an easy group near the gatehouse, ready to mount and ride, the horses saddled and tramping the cobbles with small, ringing sounds. Elis stood docile and dutiful at Einon’s stirrup, though he did not look overjoyed at being on his way home. His face was overcast like the sky. At the sound of Cadfael’s rapid steps approaching, and the sight of his face, every eye turned to fasten on him.
“I bring black news,” said Cadfael bluntly. “My lord, your labour has been wasted, and I doubt your departure must wait yet a while. We are just come from the infirmary. Gilbert Prestcote is dead.”
Chapter Six
THEY WENT WITH HIM, Hugh Beringar and Einon ab Ithel, jointly responsible here for this exchange of prisoners which had suddenly slithered away out of their control. They stood beside the bed in the dim, quiet room, the little lamp a mild yellow eye on one side, the brazier a clear red one on the other. They gazed and touched, and held a bright, smooth blade to the mouth and nose, and got no trace of breath. The body was warm and pliable, no long time dead; but dead indeed.
“Wounded and weak, and exhausted with travelling,” said Hugh wretchedly. “No blame to you, my lord, if he had sunk too far to climb back again.”
“Nevertheless, I had a mission,” said Einon. “My charge was to bring you one man, and take another back from you in exchange. This matter is void, and cannot be completed.”
“So you did bring him, living, and living you delivered him over. It is in our hands his death came. There is no bar but you should take your man and go, according to the agreement. Your part was done, and done well.”