Frevisse nodded, understanding with him. He bowed again and she bent her head to him, and did not watch him go but turned toward the choir, ready to pray now; and after Sext she would go to Dame Claire and let her see to her back and then bespeak a winter gown from Dame Juliana before taking Sister Amicia back to the guest halls.
The west door groaned on its hinges with Joliffe going out-why hadn’t she heard him coming in?-and she wished too late that she had thought to ask him if he knew where Sir Reynold and his men had been bound for today.
Chapter 13
Frevisse drew her body’s ache slowly up from the cloister walk outside the refectory, letting herself be glad of Sister Thomasine’s help. Dame Claire’s ointment had eased the hurting and some of the stiffness but not sufficiently that lying down and standing up again were any pleasure. Only twice more today, she thought, nodding her thanks at Sister Thomasine who nodded back and left her. After Vespers and again for Compline. Then there would finally be the relief of going to bed, temporary though it would be and doubtful how easily she would lie. Dame Claire had said she would give her something to help her sleep, but Frevisse was unwilling to risk failing Matins and Laud at midnight, though she anticipated no pleasure in rising for them, or again tomorrow morning, when she had had time truly to stiffen.
She turned her mind away from all that. Those troubles were for later. Just now there was the rest of today to be gone through. She looked toward Sister Amicia waiting nearby and asked, “You’re ready to go out again?”
Sister Amicia came forward. “Oh yes.” She hesitated, then said worriedly, “I’m not sure I’m remembering all you’ve told me.”
Frevisse doubted it, too, but Sister Amicia was nonetheless proving better at grasping matters than she had hoped and she said encouragingly, “When the time comes you need it, you’ll remember more than you think you do, and what you don’t remember, Ela will know and help you with.”
Sister Amicia brightened. “Yes. She likes me, I think.”
That was more than Frevisse thought, but she was saved from even a noncommittal answer by Lady Eleanor and Joice coming toward her along the walk, Margrete behind them. So far today, since Sext, Frevisse had managed to keep from having to talk to anyone except in the way of her duties, but sympathy was not something she could avoid forever, so she gave in with what she hoped passed as graciously to Lady Eleanor’s gentle questioning of how she was, smiled with what conviction she could manage, and answered, “Well enough. Better. And you?”
“Well, thank you. Nothing beyond the ordinary.”
Margrete muttered something behind her.
Lady Eleanor, without looking back, said, “That’s eased.”
“For now,” Margrete said in a carrying murmur that Lady Eleanor chose to ignore.
Tactfully, Frevisse did, too, asking Joice instead, “And with you? Did it go well last night?”
There was need to be circumspect, with Sister Amicia there to hear everything and too likely to talk of it later. Joice said, “It was pleasant,” almost as if she meant it, but to Frevisse she seemed drawn, tense, and Frevisse wondered how much longer she would be able to keep up this game of pretense.
In an excited whisper Sister Amicia said, looking past Lady Eleanor, “Oh, here’s your Benet again!”
Joice stiffened with scorn-edged anger and snapped, “He’s not my Benet.”
But he was there nonetheless, coming into the cloister walk from the outer door. He saw them, his eyes going first to Joice, then to Frevisse, and he hesitated with distressed uncertainty at sight of her. So he had heard, too. To make it easier for him, Frevisse bent her head courteously to Lady Eleanor and said clearly enough for him to hear both what she said and that she said it without anger, “We’ll leave you, then. There are things we have to see to in the guest halls.”
“Of course,” Lady Eleanor responded, matching her courtesy.
“But…” Sister Amicia protested.
Frevisse took hold of her sleeve and turned her away. They would go the long way around the walk to the door, leaving Benet to come the short way to Joice and Lady Eleanor.
“But…” Sister Amicia tried again, pulling back.
“What happened the last time I talked with Benet in the cloister?” Frevisse asked.
Sister Amicia gulped and went without arguing.
Little was left to show her in the new guest hall. They finished with time enough before Vespers to begin on the older one, but Sister Amicia as they left the new guest hall was wondering aloud not about her duties but why Mistress Joice would want to resist Benet, he was so handsome.
Wondering how Sister Amicia could resist ever having a useful thought in her head, Frevisse did not answer. In fairness-she was just able to be fair but doubted she could keep it up much longer-her irritation was not so much from what Sister Amicia chose to chatter on about but from the day’s exhaustion closing in on her rapidly now. She was convincing herself that it would probably be better not to go on to the old guest hall today but save it for tomorrow, when Sister Amicia asked, “What are they doing?”
Hoping it was nothing that would need her, Frevisse asked, “Who?”
“There.” Sister Amicia pointed across the yard at the well where a hand count of Sir Reynold’s servants were clotted, intent on something in their midst.
“It’s no concern of ours,” Frevisse said and kept on her way, only to come to a stop between one step and the next and turn toward them after all. She was tired; her mind was moving too slowly and it had taken that long for her to realize that the dirty heap among the men’s feet was the madman she had thought long gone since yesterday.
“Oh no,” she said.
“What is it?” Sister Amicia asked, somewhere between apprehension and eagerness.
Frevisse went toward the well without answering. Some of the men she recognized from yesterday; others were new to the sport; but all of them were too intent on their game to notice her approach. They had the madman crowded up against the well, hunched down among them, with no way for him to escape even if he had had the wits for it. A few were set down on their heels, prodding at him with daggers that were still sheathed but probably would not stay that way, while the rest were contenting themselves with gibing words and an occasionally shoe to whatever part of him they could easily reach. Frevisse knew how little time it would take for all of that to turn ugly and what would happen when it did. Her father had carried the scar across his shoulders the rest of his life from the time he interfered to save a beggar some men had taken against for no reason except they had nothing better to do. He had managed out of it alive when they turned on him as well, but the parish had had to bury the beggar.
The men here were turning uglier even as Frevisse approached. Someone’s boot dug into the madman’s haunch hard enough to shift him, and when he tried to scuttle a little sideways he was shoved back, hard enough to knock him over. Above the men’s laughter Frevisse ordered, “That’s enough now.”
A few of them looked at her over their shoulders. Most of them ignored her, and one of the men had unsheathed his dagger now and was flicking the point of it too near the madman’s face as he struggled to his knees. The madman threw up an arm to protect himself, and another man put a foot against his ribs and shoved him over. Others joined in, rolling him off the well’s top step and down the rest onto the cobbles. Angrily Frevisse started forward, intent on coming between them and the man. Sister Amicia squeaked, “You can’t!” and caught her by the arm while the men, probably enjoying it more now they had women to watch them being brave, kept the madman down with kicks and jabs and at least one more dagger unsheathed. Frevisse pulled loose from Sister Amicia, ignoring the pain it cost across her back, and thrust in among them, ordering in open anger now, “That’s enough!,” grabbing the nearest of them by the arm and pulling him around.