‘Quite, quite,’ Helewise was saying impatiently. ‘But for what purpose? And why should Sister Caliste know about it, whatever it was, and be prompted to follow her?’
‘Abbess, there’s something else,’ Josse said. ‘Something which, unless I’m very much mistaken, is more dreadful than a young woman going off into the forest at night.’
A sudden terrible thought struck him. Caliste was safely back within the Abbey walls, but Esyllt wasn’t.
Oh, God, what if that appalling, long drawn-out scream of agony had been hers?
What if it was she who now lay insensate in the forest, hidden in some place off the main track?
‘What? Josse, what?’ The Abbess was shaking him. ‘Tell me! Dear God, but you’ve gone ashen!’
He stood up. ‘Abbess, when I was still deep in the forest, I heard a dreadful cry. I’m very much afraid that the killer has struck again. And that-’
‘Esyllt!’ Now she, too, was ashen. ‘Oh, no! Oh, sweet Jesus, no! Not-’
‘There were others abroad!’ he said, grabbing her by her hands. ‘I fear there’s no doubt but that there’s been another attack, but, Abbess, it is by no means certain that the victim must be Esyllt!’
She was staring at him wide-eyed. ‘We must go and look!’ she cried. ‘Whoever the victim is, we must search for them. Now! All of us!’
And, before he could even try to stop her, she had rushed out of the room, skirts of her habit flying, calling out to her senior nuns. Very soon afterwards, she had made her arrangements; efficient even in such a frightful crisis, she had organised and dispatched the search parties more quickly than Josse would have thought possible.
He waited for her to come back and tell him what she wanted of him, and at last she returned to her room. Wiping sweat from her brow — the night was close — she said, ‘Sir Josse, will you come out and search with me?’
Making her a bow, he said, ‘Gladly I will.’
* * *
Marching off into the forest, Abbess Helewise was more glad than she would have admitted to have Josse’s steady tread at her side. And she had made sure that Sister Euphemia, Sister Basilia and Sister Martha also had strong men with them in their search parties; moreover, every man of them armed with stout staves. Few of the lay brothers, she reflected, would have much sleep this night.
The darkness under the trees was more profound than she had expected. But then, the night was wearing on, and the moon no longer so high in the sky. Full moon, she mused. Full moon again, and now a second murder.
To take her mind off her fears over who the victim was, she said to Josse, ‘Sir Josse, do you realise that-’
But she never asked her question. For at that moment, flying towards them with her skirts raised high around her bare thighs, blood on her outstretched hands, on her chin and on her gown, hair awry and face as pale as death, came Esyllt.
Seeing them, she screamed, ‘He’s dead! And there’s so much blood!’
Then she rushed into Helewise’s arms.
In the first few seconds, Helewise could do nothing but hold the girl tightly against her breast, cradling her, quieting the harsh sound of her sobbing.
‘Hush, child,’ she murmured, dropping a kiss on the wild hair, ‘you’re safe now. We won’t let any harm come to you.’
Esyllt pulled away from her, craning round to look back over her shoulder down the path along which she had just come.
‘He’s in there,’ she said, with a shudder. ‘Way back there. Lying deep in the underbrush, and he’s dead, I’m sure he’s dead, he must be dead!’ She was rapidly losing control again.
Josse said gently, ‘Who is dead, Esyllt?’
She spun round to look at him, staring at him wide-eyed as if she did not recognise him. But then a shadow of her usual smile touched her lips. ‘Sir Knight,’ she said. ‘Are you going to come and see my old dearies?’
‘Soon,’ Josse said. ‘I promise.’
She nodded. ‘Good. They’ll like that.’ Then, as if awareness of her present distress, momentarily put aside, had come flooding back, her face crumpled and she whispered something.
‘What was that?’ Helewise asked, rather too sharply.
Esyllt shook her head, tears flowing down her face. ‘Nothing,’ she muttered.
‘Esyllt,’ Helewise persisted, ‘something terrible has happened, and, for the moment, our Christian duty is to find this poor man who has been attacked and do what we can for him.’
‘You can’t do anything, he’s dead, I keep telling you, dead, dead!’ Esyllt moaned. A great shiver went through her, and her sobbing began again. ‘And, oh, God, it’s so awful! I — he — you see, we…’
‘Then we must take him back to the Abbey for decent burial,’ Helewise replied implacably, cutting off whatever Esyllt had been trying to say. ‘Then — and only then — will we set about trying to discover what lies behind all this.’ She gave the girl a gentle shake. ‘Do you understand, Esyllt? You are in no condition to be questioned now, but we will be doing so when you have recovered yourself.’
Helewise wondered if Josse would realise what she was trying to do. Wondered, too, if he had noticed what Helewise had seen, when Esyllt had first rushed out of the trees towards them. No, she told herself. Don’t think about that now. Time enough to get to the bottom of that later, when they were safely back inside the Abbey walls.
By speaking firmly to the girl — in effect, shutting her up — the Abbess was hoping to make sure that, in her shock and confusion, Esyllt didn’t blurt out something she would later regret.
There was always the danger that, if she spoke up now, she might somehow incriminate herself. And the one thing Helewise was quite sure about was that, whatever else she might have done, Esyllt was no murderer.
Josse must have been sure, too. For he said, ‘No, Esyllt, no more questions for now. We shall call out and attract the attention of one of the other search parties. Then you will be taken back to the Abbey, where they will look after you. Just tell me where to find the victim, then you can go into the warmth and the light, wash, change your clothes, then sleep until you feel better.’
Esyllt’s eyes were fixed on him as he spoke, and, when he had finished, she smiled at him. ‘You have a kind heart, Sir Knight,’ she said. ‘Doesn’t he, Abbess Helewise?’
‘Indeed,’ Helewise agreed.
‘May I do that?’ Esyllt asked her. She was, it appeared, sufficiently herself to remember that it was Helewise, not Josse, who ordered her actions.
‘You may,’ Helewise said.
Josse had trotted off down the main track, calling out as he went. Presently he had an answer, and, shortly after that, Brother Saul, Sister Euphemia and the other two lay brothers in their group came into sight.
When they had finished exclaiming and offering up thanks over Esyllt’s having been found alive and safe, Sister Euphemia put her arm round the girl and the group set off with her back towards the Abbey.
‘Brother Saul?’ Josse called after him.
He stopped. ‘Sir Josse?’
‘We have an unpleasant duty to perform,’ Josse said. He shot a look at Helewise, who had a good idea what was coming. ‘Esyllt has told us where to find the man who was attacked,’ Josse went on, ‘and I wonder, Brother Saul, if you would come with me, so that the Abbess can go back to-’
Yes. It was exactly what Helewise had expected. ‘Sir Josse,’ she interrupted, ‘I am leading this expedition, and I shall not return to the Abbey until we have accomplished what we set out to do.’ She added, dropping her voice so that Brother Saul would not hear, ‘And I’ll thank you to remember that it is I, not you, who is in command here!’
He looked suitably reprimanded, and for a brief moment she felt a rich satisfaction. Then she thought, but he was trying to help! Trying to spare me a possibly — no, a definitely — terrible sight. I should not have bitten his head off for that impulse to charity.