Abbot Radulfus had emerged from his garden and was approaching briskly, with Rhun attendant at his elbow. He said nothing until he had drawn back the covering from Bertred’s head and shoulders and surveyed him in sombre and thoughtful silence for a long moment. Then he again covered the dead face, and turned to Cadfael.
“Brother Rhun has told me where he was found, and how, but he does not know who the man is. Do you?”
“Yes, Father. His name is Bertred, he is Mistress Perle’s foreman weaver. I saw him yesterday out with the sheriff’s men, helping in the hunt for the lady.”
“Who has not been found,” said Radulfus.
“No. This is the third day of searching for her, but she has not been found.”
“And her man is found dead.” There was no need to point out to him implications which were already plain. “Are you satisfied that he drowned?”
“Father, I need to consider that. I think he did, but also he has suffered a blow to the head. I would like to examine his body further.”
“So, I suppose, would the lord sheriff,” said the abbot briskly. “I’ll send to him at once, and keep the body here for the present. Do you know if he could swim?”
“No, Father, but there are few born here who can’t. His kin or his master will tell us.”
“Yes, we must also send to them. But perhaps later, after Hugh has seen him, and made what you and he between you can of the matter.” And to the bearers of the litter, who had laid it down meanwhile and stood waiting silently, a little apart, he said: “Take him to the mortuary chapel. You had best strip him and lay him decently. Light candles for him. However and for whatever cause he died, he is our mortal brother. I’ll send a groom to look for Hugh Beringar. Wait with me, Cadfael, until he comes. I want to know everything you have gathered concerning this poor girl who is lost.”
In the mortuary chapel they had laid Bertred’s naked body on the stone bier, and covered him with a linen cloth. His sodden clothes lay loosely folded aside, with the boots they had drawn from his feet. The light being dim in there, they had also provided candles on tall holders, so that they could be placed wherever they gave the best light. They stood close about the slab, Abbot Radulfus, Brother Cadfael and Hugh Beringar. It was the abbot who drew down the linen and uncovered the dead, who lay with his hands duly crossed on his breast, drawn out very straight and dignified. Someone had reverently closed the eyes Cadfael remembered as half-open, like someone just waking, too late ever to complete the awakening.
A youthful body and a handsome, perhaps slightly over-muscled for perfection. Not much past twenty, surely, and blessed with features regular and shapely, again perhaps a shade over-abundant in flesh or under-provided with bone. The Welsh are accustomed to seeing in the faces of neighbours the strong solidity and permanence of bone, are sensitive to loss where they see it pared down over-cushioned in others. Nevertheless, a very comely young man. Face and neck and shoulders, and from elbow to fingertips, he was tanned by outdoor sun and wind, though the brown was dulled and sad now.
“Not a mark on him,” said Hugh, looking him over from head to feet, “barring that knock on his forehead. And that surely caused him nothing worse than a headache.”
High near the hairline the skin was certainly broken, but it seemed no more than a glancing blow. Cadfael took up the head, with its thick thatch of brown hair plastered to the broad forehead, between his hands, and felt about the skull with probing fingers. “He has another dunt, here, on the side, here in his hair, above the ear. Something with a long, sharp edge - through all this thickness of hair it made a scalp wound. That could have knocked the wits out of him for some time, perhaps, but not killed. No, he certainly drowned.”
“What could the man have been doing?” asked the abbot, pondering. “At that spot on that shore, in the night? There’s nothing there, no path that leads anywhere, no house to he visited. Hard to see what business a man could possibly have there in the dark.”
“The business he’d been on all yesterday,” said Hugh, “is the hunt for his mistress. He was in Mistress Perle’s service, of her household, he offered his help, and so far as I saw he gave it, unsparingly, and in good earnest. How if he was still bent on continuing the search?”
“By night? And there? There is nothing there but open meadow and a few groves of trees,” said Radulfus, “not one cottage for some distance, once past our border, nowhere that a stolen woman could be hidden. Even if he had been found on the opposite bank it would have been more believable, at least that gives access to the town and the houses of the Castle Foregate. But even so - by night, and a dark night until late...“
“And even so, how did he come by two blows on the head and end in the river? A man might go too near on a shelving bank, and miss his footing in the dark,” said Hugh, shaking his head, “but of a native Shrewsbury lad I doubt it. They know their river. We must find out if he was a swimmer, but the most of them learn early. Cadfael, we know where he was cast up. Is it possible he went into the water on the other side? If he tried to swim across, half-stunned after he got these injuries, might he fetch up about where you found him?”
“That we should ask of Madog,” said Cadfael. “He’ll know. The currents are certainly very strong and contrary in places, it would be possible.” He straightened the wet hair almost absently on the dead man’s forehead, and drew up the linen over his face. “There’s nothing more he can tell us. It remains to tell his kin. At least they may be able to say when last they saw him, and whether he owned to having any plans for the night.”
“I’ve sent for Miles Coliar, but said nothing to him yet of the reason. Better he should break it to the mother, it will come easier for her there, in her own home - for I’m told she belongs there, in the kitchen. And Coliar will need to have the body taken back there to make ready for burial, if you see no need to keep it longer.”
“None,” said Cadfael, turning away from the bier with a sigh. “At your discretion, both! I have done.” But at the door, last to leave the chapel, he cast one long glance back at the still white shape on the slab of stone. One more young man dead untimely, sad waste of the stuff of life. “Poor lad!” said Cadfael, and closed the door gently after him.
Miles Coliar came from the town in haste and alone, uninformed of the occasion for the summons, but certainly aware that there must be a grave reason, and by the look of his face speculating anxiously and fearfully as to what that might be. They awaited him in the ante-room of the gatehouse. Miles made his reverence to abbot and sheriff, and raised a worried countenance to look rapidly from face to face, questioning their solemnity.
“My lord, is there news? My cousin? Have you got word of her, that you sent for me here?” His pallor blanched still more, and his face stiffened into a mask of dread, misreading, it seemed, their mute and sombre looks. “Oh, God, no! Not, no, she cannot be! You have not found her?” His voice foundered on the word ‘dead’, but his lips shaped it.
“No, no!” said Hugh in haste. “Not that! No, there’s nothing new, no word of her yet, no need to think the worst. This is quite another matter, though grim enough. The hunt for your cousin goes on, and will go on until we find her.”
Miles said: “Thank God!” just audibly, and drew deep breath, the tense lines of his face relaxing. “Pardon if I am slow to think and speak and understand, and too hasty to fear extremes. These few days I have hardly slept or rested at all.”
“I am sorry to add more to your troubles,” said Hugh, “but needs must. It’s not Mistress Perle we’re concerned with here. Have you missed any man from your looms today?”