‘I would never have thought it possible, Brother Marzin, but I miss that mule.’ The monk snapped an overlong branch into more manageable pieces. ‘I regret Prior Hubert’s selling of him.’
The other monk laughed and waved at the baskets. ‘You miss the mule because he carried these, Dominig,’ he said.
‘No, Marzin, it’s more than that. That mule belonged to my father. I shall miss him when I go to the river.’ To Brother Dominig’s delight, Prior Hubert had given him permanent charge of the fish tanks and eel traps.
‘That mule was an intractable beast.’
‘I brought him from home. I liked him.’
‘Theirs was the greater need, Brother Dominig.’
Conan gave a silent, cavernous yawn.
‘Aye, so it was. I cannot deny that. Poor girl. So young and left to shoulder so much responsibility.’
Mid-yawn, Conan stiffened and strained to hear. Girl? What girl? To his intense annoyance, he saw the dirty white cur creep into the corner of his vision. He had thought he had foisted the animal off on Johanna. Motioning the dog away, Conan prayed it would not betray him. His poorly stomach churned.
‘True.’ The monk named Marzin had a strong voice which was easy to hear despite its foreign lilt. ‘But consider, Dominig, how God provided for her. He gave her Ned Fletcher to share her burden, and then my brother arrived.’
Wondering who the monk’s brother was, and how he fitted into this, Conan listened for more. He remembered Ned Fletcher. Was this monk English, like Ned Fletcher?
‘I cannot help wondering,’ Dominig mused, ‘why God permitted the Count to destroy Mistress Gwenn’s home in the first place. If He was so eager to provide for her, why did He allow that to happen?’
‘Brother Dominig!’ Marzin clucked disapproval.
Conan heard the reproof implicit in the young monk’s tone, but skulking behind the hazel, with a wary eye on the wretched dog and an obstructed view of the two monks, he was unable to see the affectionate mockery in Brother Marzin’s eyes.
‘It’s only a day since you took your vows, and already you are questioning His will.’
Another log thudded into a basket. Furtively parting the branches, Conan saw that one of the monks, presumably Dominig, had his lips set in a straight line. ‘Mock me if you will, Marzin,’ he said miserably. ‘But try as I might, I cannot understand how God can be so cruel.’
Marzin went over to his companion. ‘It’s man that is cruel, Dominig, not the Almighty.’
Dominig gazed for a moment at Marzin’s round, open countenance. ‘You are blessed, Brother, you have such faith. Would that I had a tenth of your faith.’
Marzin’s plump face was split by a smile. ‘Faith upholds me, when all else fails.’
‘But, Marzin–’
Marzin shook his pale, newly tonsured crown. ‘Not now, Dominig, the kindling is needed in the cookhouse.’
Obediently, Dominig scanned the clearing, his eyes chancing on a fallen branch in front of Conan’s hazel hide. Crossing over, he scooped up the bough. Conan’s belly cramped with the fear of imminent discovery, but the monk merely straightened and reverted to his original theme. ‘What do you think they will do with my mule when they reach their journey’s end?’
‘Your mule?’ Marzin said, lifting an eyebrow. ‘We hold all our possessions in common, Dominig, have you forgot?’
‘I haven’t forgotten, Marzin.’ Dominig’s reply was almost sharp. ‘But that animal did belong to my father. I brought him with me when I joined as a novice. I can’t help it if I am attached to him.’
‘Don’t you think your attachment to that animal might in part be the reason Prior Hubert gave him up so easily?’ Marzin asked. ‘In selling him, he broke your bondage to the past.’
‘But it’s a long way they’re taking him.’
Where are they taking him? Behind his bush, Conan willed the dog to keep still. He willed the monks to supply him with the answer he needed. Where? Where were they going?
‘Not so far,’ Marzin reassured his brother. ‘Ploumanach is only five days away the way your mule plods.’
‘Ploumanach,’ Conan breathed, and a slow smile spread across his weathered face. ‘Ploumanach.’ In Breton, Ploumanach meant ‘place of the monks’, and that didn’t tell Conan its location. He hadn’t the foggiest idea where Ploumanach was, but he would find out.
‘Five days away?’ Brother Dominig’s knowledge of distant places, like most people’s, was limited to a ten-mile radius of his home, in his case the monastery. Anything outside that he knew about in only the most hazy terms.
‘Relax, Ploumanach is in Brittany, Dominig,’ Marzin replied with a laugh. ‘Your mule is still in Christendom.’
Conan had the information he had come for. ‘Ploumanach,’ he muttered. ‘Ploumanach.’ And holding the branches aside with finger and thumb, he stole from the clearing.
If he did what was expected of him, he should hand this information on to Captain Malait together with what Johanna had told him about the jewel, but he was pulled two ways. Was it likely that the Viking’s reward would come anywhere near the value of the gem? If it turned out to be half the size that Johanna had said, it would be worth a fortune.
The little white cur nudged his heels. About to lash out, it occurred to Conan that the mongrel, by not betraying his presence to the monks, was learning sense. He deserved a reward. Ferreting a heel of wheat loaf and a chunk of meat from his scrip, Conan threw them to the dog which devoured them in two famished bites.
Conan thought hard as he strode through the trees. Was this the moment to break away from de Roncier? He had been thinking that it was time he did something for himself, and this jewel of Gwenn Herevi’s was a godsend – if it existed.
Conan understood that such a betrayal would mean exile from his home, for the Count had a long memory; but Conan was rootless. He did not feel bound to Vannes and Southern Brittany any more than he felt bound to his sister Johanna. He spared the sibling he had so casually abandoned in the disreputable hostelry no more than a passing thought. He was not his sister’s keeper, and in any case, the girl was no innocent – had she not already born a child? Johanna could fend for herself.
The pedlar wavered, unable quite to take the final decision to strike out in a new direction. ‘Ploumanach. Ploumanach,’ he muttered imprinting the name in his mind. ‘Shall we go there, boy?’ he asked the dog, whose canine eyes were riveted on his feeder. The stumpy tail wagged, eagerly. Assuming the jewel existed, suppose it was lost or sold by the time he reached Ploumanach? He would have thrown away a spasmodic but fairly regular source of money by alienating Captain Malait. It was a risk. On the other hand, if he got his hands on the gem, he would never have to worry about where the next crust was coming from.
Conan came to a decision.
***
It was the middle of the afternoon, and Philippe, who had spent the morning either dozing or gazing up at the nodding leaves, had tired of the novelty of the ride. His crying had at first been petulant and fretful, but now he was working himself up into a genuine rage, kicking his legs against the wrapping which held him immobile in his sister’s arms.
Alan, coming at length to the conclusion that St Clair’s heir was not going to cry himself to sleep, reined back. ‘Do you want to stop?’
Gwenn flung him a grateful look, eyes harassed, hair in disarray, as she juggled with reins and infant’s coverlet. ‘Could we, Alan? Do you think it’s safe?’
Alan dismounted. ‘A few minutes won’t hurt,’ he said, stretching like a cat and coming towards her. ‘We could all do with a change.’
‘Philippe is not used to being confined. He doesn’t normally cry like this, but he’s learning to crawl, and he finds the restrictions irksome.’
Reaching Gwenn first, Ned took her reins from her and wound them round a branch before lifting Philippe from her lap. As soon as the baby was placed on the ground and his coverlet removed, the crying stopped.