Caris said: “Joseph, take one of the chickens out of the cage.”
Toby said: “Wait a moment-”
“Trust me, Toby,” Caris said. “You know I wouldn’t treat you unjustly, don’t you?”
“Well, I can’t deny that…”
Joe opened the cage and picked up a scrawny brown-feathered chicken by its feet. The bird’s head turned jerkily from side to side, as if it was bewildered to see the world upside down.
Caris said: “Now give it to Toby’s wife.”
“What?”
“Would I cheat you, Joseph?”
Joe reluctantly handed the chicken to Toby’s wife, a pretty, sulky type. “There you are, then, Jane.”
Jane took it with alacrity.
Caris said to her: “Now thank Joe.”
Jane looked petulant, but she said: “I thank you, Joseph Blacksmith.”
Caris said: “Now, Toby, give a chicken to Ellie Blacksmith.”
Toby obeyed, with a sheepish grin. Joe’s wife, Ellie, who was heavily pregnant, smiled and said: “Thank you, Toby Peterson.”
They were returning to normal, and beginning to realize the foolishness of what they had been doing.
Jane said: “What about the third chicken?”
“I’m coming to that,” Caris said. She looked at the watching crowd and pointed at a sensible-looking girl of eleven or twelve. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Jesca, Mother Prior – the daughter of John Constable.”
“Take the other chicken to St Peter’s church and give it to Father Michael. Say that Toby and Joe will be coming to ask forgiveness for the sin of covetousness.”
“Yes, sister.” Jesca picked up the third chicken and went off.
Joe’s wife, Ellie, said: “You may remember, Mother Caris, that you helped my husband’s baby sister, Minnie, when she burned her arm in the forge.”
“Oh, yes, of course,” Caris said. It had been a nasty burn, she remembered. “She must be ten now.”
“That’s right.”
“Is she well?”
“Right as rain, thanks to you, and God’s grace.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
“Would you care to step into my house for a cup of ale, Mother Prioress?”
“I’d love to, but I’m in a hurry.” She turned to the men. “God bless you, and no more fighting.”
Joe said: “Thank you.”
Caris walked away.
Toby called after her: “Thank you, mother.”
She waved without looking back.
She noticed several more houses that appeared to have been broken into, presumably to be looted after the occupants died. Someone ought to do something about it, she thought. But with Elfric as alderman, and a disappearing prior, there was no one to take the initiative.
She reached St Peter’s and found Elfric with a team of paviours and their apprentices in the nave. Stone slabs were stacked all around, and the men were preparing the ground, pouring sand and smoothing it with sticks. Elfric was checking that the surface was level, using a complicated piece of apparatus with a wooden frame and a dangling cord with a lead point at its end. The apparatus looked like a miniature gallows, and it reminded Caris that Elfric had tried to get her hanged for witchcraft ten years ago. She was surprised to find that she felt no hatred for him. He was too mean-spirited and small-minded for that. When she looked at him, she felt nothing but contempt.
She waited for him to finish, then said abruptly: “Did you know that Godwyn and all the monks have run away?”
She intended to surprise him, and she knew by his look of astonishment that he had no foreknowledge. “Why would they…? When…? Oh, last night?”
“You didn’t see them.”
“I heard something.”
“I saw them,” said a paviour. He leaned on his spade to talk. “I was coming out of the Holly Bush. It was dark, but they had torches. The prior was riding, and the rest walking, but they had a sight of baggage: wine casks and wheels of cheese and I don’t know what.”
Caris already knew that Godwyn had emptied the monks’ food stores. He had not tried to take any of the nuns’ supplies, which were kept separately. “What time was that?”
“Not late – nine or ten o’clock.”
“Did you speak to them?”
“Just to say goodnight.”
“Any clue as to where they might have been headed?”
The paviour shook his head. “They went over the bridge, but I didn’t see which road they took at Gallows Cross.”
Caris turned to Elfric. “Think back over the past few days. Did Godwyn say anything to you that, with hindsight, might relate to this? Mention any place names – Monmouth, York, Antwerp, Bremen?”
“No. I had no clue.” Elfric looked grumpy about not having been forewarned, which made Caris think he was telling the truth.
If Elfric was surprised, it was unlikely that anyone else had known what Godwyn planned. Godwyn was fleeing from the plague, and clearly he did not want anyone to follow him, bringing the disease with them. “Leave early, go far and stay long,” Merthin had said. Godwyn could be anywhere.
“If you hear from him, or any of the monks, please tell me,” Caris said.
Elfric said nothing.
Caris raised her voice to make sure the workmen heard. “Godwyn has stolen all the precious ornaments,” she said. There was a rumble of indignation. The men felt proprietorial about the cathedral ornaments – indeed, the wealthier craftsmen had probably helped pay for some of them. “The bishop wants them back. Anyone who helps Godwyn, even just by concealing his whereabouts, is guilty of sacrilege.”
Elfric looked bewildered. He had based his life on ingratiating himself with Godwyn. Now his patron had gone. He said: “There may be some perfectly innocent explanation…”
“If there is, why did Godwyn tell no one? Or even leave behind a letter?”
Elfric could not think of anything to say.
Caris realized she was going to have to speak to all the leading merchants, and the sooner the better. “I’d like you to call a meeting,” she said to Elfric. Then she thought of a more persuasive way of putting it. “The bishop wants the parish guild to meet today, after dinner. Please inform the members.”
“Very well,” said Elfric.
They would all be there, Caris knew, agog with curiosity.
She left St Peter’s and headed back towards the priory. As she passed the White Horse tavern, she saw something that made her pause. A young girl was talking to an older man, and there was something about the interaction that raised Caris’s hackles. She always felt the vulnerability of girls very sharply – perhaps because she remembered herself as an adolescent, perhaps because of the daughter she had never had. She drew back into a doorway and studied them.
The man was poorly dressed except for a costly fur hat. Caris did not know him, but she guessed he was a labourer and had inherited the hat. So many people had died that there was a glut of finery, and you saw odd sights like this all the time. The girl was about fourteen years old, and pretty, with an adolescent figure. She was trying to be coquettish, Caris saw with disapproval; though she was not very convincing. The man took money from his purse, and they seemed to be arguing. Then the man fondled the girl’s small breast.
Caris had seen enough. She marched up to the pair. The man took one look at her nun’s habit and walked quickly away. The girl looked both guilty and resentful. Caris said: “What are you doing – trying to sell your body?”
“No, mother.”
“Tell the truth! Why did you let him feel your breast?”
“I don’t know what to do! I haven’t got anything to eat, and now you’ve chased him away.” She burst into tears.
Caris could believe the girl was hungry. She looked thin and pale. “Come with me,” Caris said. “I’ll give you something to eat.”
She took the girl’s arm and steered her towards the priory. “What’s your name?” she asked.
“Ismay.”
“How old are you?”
“Thirteen.”
They reached the priory and Caris took Ismay to the kitchen, where the nuns’ dinner was being prepared under the supervision of a novice called Oonagh. The kitchener, Josephine, had fallen to the plague. “Give this child some bread and butter,” Caris said to Oonagh.