It heartened Josse that someone, at least, had been shedding tears for Gunnora.
By the time the meal ended and he stood to join the nuns in their prayers, he had made up his mind what the next step was.
* * *
Abbess Helewise seemed unsurprised when he announced, as they left the refectory, his intention of seeking out Gunnora’s family, provided the Abbess was willing to divulge the whereabouts of their home.
‘That I will,’ she said. ‘Follow me back to my room, and I will tell you where they live and how to get there. I think,’ she added over her shoulder, ‘that you are taking the logical next step.’
Once they were within the privacy of the Abbess’s small room, he said, ‘May I ask you a further question, Abbess?’
She inclined her head, which he took for an affirmative.
‘The nuns sitting apart from the community just now, at the midday meal. I have not been able to work out why.’
She smiled briefly. ‘And you are asking yourself if there is some lurid explanation? They are in disgrace for some heinous misdemeanour? Contaminated, perhaps, from nursing patients with the plague or the pox?’
‘Neither of those things!’ he protested, not entirely accurately.
‘They are our virgin nuns,’ she said quietly, all traces of amusement gone from her face. ‘As in the abbey at Fontevraud, our community is divided, with separate accommodation according to how a sister opts to use her life in God. Most choose the easier life of the Madeleine Convent — many of us lived a full life in the world before entry here, and do not consider ourselves worthy of a life spent solely with God. But for those women who led an exemplary life in the world, who, even before taking the veil, lived quietly, modestly and in celibacy; there is the option of enclosure in the Virgin House, where they spend their days and much of their nights in contemplation and communion with the Lord.’
He was nodding earnestly, even while a part of him was thinking, what a life! ‘And those sisters, the virgin nuns, do not join with you, even for meals?’
‘No. The Rule considers it is best for them not to brush too closely with those who retain one foot in the world. They are segregated in chapel, also, and they live in separate accommodation; their small house is attached to the Lady Chapel.’ Her eyes met his, and, anticipating his next question, she answered it. ‘Gunnora would not have had any contact whatsoever with any of the virgin sisters. Assure yourself that none of them would even have known who she was.’
And so, she seemed to add silently, you can cross those seventeen women off your list of suspects.
He said gravely, ‘I thank you, Abbess Helewise. I shall do precisely that.’
* * *
She said farewell to him in her room, wishing him a safe journey and God’s speed. Then, with a pleasant sense of having earned her approbation, notwithstanding the more intrusive of his questions, he set off to find his horse.
A nun wearing a sacking apron over her habit was working in the stables, sleeves rolled back to display forearms any sailor would have been proud of. She was mucking out, and wielded a pitchfork with an easy rhythm that suggested long familiarity.
‘I’ve fed your horse,’ she said, as he greeted her and announced he was about to leave. ‘Rubbed him down and all. He’ll not be thinking to work again this day, I reckon. You’ll no doubt find him a deal frisky.’ She grinned, showing gaps in her side teeth. ‘I was about to turn him out with our lot, he’d have looked like a king alongside ’em.’
He looked out to the paddock she indicated, where a solid but amiable-looking cob had raised an enquiring head. There was a more delicately built but short-legged pony — surely on the small side for any but the slightest-built of the sisters? — and a mule. He saw what the sister had meant.
‘Thank you for your care of him.’ In any other stable, he’d have offered a coin or two, but it didn’t seem appropriate in a convent. Instead he paid her a compliment: ‘You run a sweet-smelling, well-tended stable, Sister-’
‘Sister Martha,’ she said. ‘I thank you, sir knight.’
‘Josse d’Acquin,’ he supplied.
She grinned again. ‘I know. I know, too, what you’re here for and, as to where you’re bound now, I can guess.’ The smile faded and she moved closer to him, face intense. ‘Find him, sir. I had no great love for Gunnora, God punish me for my lack of charity, but no creature ever deserved that fate.’
He met her honest blue eyes. ‘I’ll do my best, Sister Martha. You have my word.’
With an emphatic nod, as if to say, the word of a knight’ll do for me, Sister Martha went back to her mucking out.
* * *
The lands of Gunnora’s father lay some eighteen miles roughly to the south-east of Hawkenlye. Setting out the hour after noon, Josse would arrive at dusk. The estate was sufficiently close to the town of Newenden for him to put up there; it was his intention to view Gunnora’s home this evening, gleaning what impression he could, and then retire to an inn. He would present himself to her family in the morning.
It ocurred to him on the road that it would better serve his purpose not to draw attention to himself. He stopped and dismounted, extracted a light and well-worn cloak from his pack, and, removing his embroidered tunic, stowed it away. He held the cloak at arm’s length, studying it with a critical eye. Worn it might be, but it still looked suspiciously good quality. With a slight sigh, he threw it down on to the track and trod it into the dust. Then he shook it and put it on. He drew the hood over his head so that its edge shaded his face; the afternoon sun was strong.
Abbess Helewise’s directions had been accurate, and he found his way to Winnowlands easily, only once having to ask for assistance. Odd, he thought, riding away from the small group of dwellings where he had consulted an old man laboriously winding up water from a well. The old boy seemed friendly enough as I rode into the yard — I even thought he was about to offer me water. But as soon as I mentioned Winnowlands, he changed.
Trying to put aside one possibly loopy old man’s prejudice and maintain an open mind, Josse rode on.
* * *
The Winnowlands estates, he could see straightaway, were rich. The land here, on the edge of the escarpment that rose up to the north of the great marshland, was good, and put to a variety of uses. Herds of cows grazed in well-grassed meadows, and flocks of sheep fattened themselves on the sparser grass nearer the marshes. The land under the plough was well-tended and looked fertile, and the strips were neat and tidily fenced. There were several huddles of dwellings, and, inspecting one which was clearly visible from the road, Josse noted that the reed-thatch roofs looked sound. One or two small cultivated areas near to the dwellings were thick with cabbages, carrots and onions, and in one, someone was growing some tiny pink flowers. In a fenced-off run, a sow and her young rootled in the dirt.
The land, quite clearly, yielded a good living. This should have been a happy place.
Why, then, Josse wondered as he slowly rode on, was there such an air of despondency? The few people he had seen — and why were they so few? Where was everyone? — seemed hardly to be aware of the stranger in their midst. Wasn’t that in itself strange? Josse had travelled countless miles, through all sorts of alien lands, and the one constant factor among all the different peoples he had encountered — especially the country people — was their curiosity. Well, you could understand it. They lived small lives, probably never went further away than the boundaries of the manor where they’d been born and where, in due course, they’d die. Saw exactly the same faces, year in, year out. A stranger was a rarity. Someone to be stared at, his possible provenance and purpose discussed and analysed for days, if not weeks, afterwards.