‘If you didn’t know, then you couldn’t possibly tell her,’ Josse said reasonably.
‘Yes, but you see, there were other things I could have told her but I didn’t,’ Berthe persisted. ‘And it’s not fair, when she’s been so kind to me.’ The girl was still half-lying on Josse’s bed; now she drew up her legs and settled against him, like a puppy curling up to its dam. ‘I wish she were here.’
Josse sensed the thought forming in her. He held his peace; if he were to suggest it, she might clam up. .
She said presently, ‘I suppose I could tell you. You’re her friend, you just said so, and so telling you would be almost as good. Wouldn’t it?’
This child is suffering from a heavy conscience, Josse thought. The urge to unburden herself is strong.
Hoping he was doing the right thing, he said, ‘Yes, Berthe. And whatever you tell me, I promise to pass on to Abbess Helewise, as soon as she gets back.’
Berthe gave a soft little sigh. Then: ‘My mother died a long time ago. I don’t know why Alba said we had to say she died when Father did, and I didn’t like saying it. Mother was loving and kind. Father wasn’t kind at all, and it didn’t seem right to pretend that they’d died together, because if Mother had died just recently, when Father did, then we’d really be grieving for her. I didn’t like people seeing I wasn’t sad, and thinking it meant I hadn’t loved my mother. Do you see what I mean?’
‘Very clearly.’ Josse gave her a hug. Then he asked, ‘Berthe, you just said you didn’t know why you had to pretend your mother had only just died. But, if you’re really clever, and puzzle at it terribly hard, do you think you could have a guess?’
Berthe though for a while. Then she said tentatively, ‘Perhaps it was because Alba knew we weren’t really unhappy over Father dying. So if people knew the truth — that it was really only Father who’d just died — they’d think there wasn’t any real excuse for her taking us away from our old home.’
Josse thought he understood. ‘She needed a convincing story to cover her action in getting you all away from the area,’ he said slowly. ‘And so she said it was the shock and the grief of losing both your father and your greatly-beloved mother.’
‘Mm,’ Berthe said. She was humming gently to herself, and he sensed that the confession had done her good. With a gentle push, he said, ‘Berthe, will you go and find a jar? The bluebells need to be put in water.’
‘All right,’ she said.
He watched idly as she went off towards the bench where jugs of water were kept. She approached Sister Beata, who bent down to listen, then pointed towards a shelf under the bench.
He was thinking hard. Yes. It was beginning to make sense. The father’s death would have made the girls homeless, but, without the false grief, there was no reason for the sisters to go so far away. The logical thing would surely have been for Alba to find some place locally for her sisters, then return to her Ely convent.
Josse was coming to the conclusion that arranging a new home for Meriel and Berthe had not been the reason behind Alba’s actions at all. What she had been desperate to do was to get herself or her sisters, or possibly all three of them, away from their old home.
A very long way away.
And why?
Suddenly he understood why Alba had been so agitated when Berthe was sent down to work with the pilgrims visiting the Holy Shrine in the Vale. She was terrified that somebody from their old home would arrive and recognise the girl.
Something else was tapping at the edge of his mind. . something that had worried him before, the day Helewise had told him about the murdered pilgrim. .
It would not come into focus. Deliberately he thought about something else. Look at Berthe down there, stopping to let that old woman with the crippled foot smell the bluebells — enchanting, sweet-natured child she is. .
And into his mind flashed the word Walsingham.
Yes! Of course! The dead man had worn a badge from the Shrine of Our Lady at Walsingham.
And Walsingham was only fifty miles north of Ely.
Was it relevant? Had he stumbled on something really useful? He concentrated, trying to see a way through the strands of the mystery. The murdered man could surely be nothing more than he seemed, an honest pilgrim who had travelled to several holy places and, with the visit to Hawkenlye, was adding another to the list.
But they had said he spoke with a strange accent! Could that have been the accent of eastern England?
Oh, Josse thought in frustration, this is useless! Every time I think I have found an answer, two more questions arise from it to vex me!
Berthe had returned, and was placing the jar of bluebells carefully beside his bed. ‘There! I’ve put them close, so you’ll be able to smell the lovely scent.’
‘Thank you, Berthe.’
She answered his smile. ‘I have to go now, Sir Josse. But I’ll come back soon.’
‘Please do.’ He leaned forward as she bent to give the now-customary kiss on his cheek. ‘Goodbye.’
When she had gone, he made himself summarise what he had discovered.
Although Berthe’s mother had died some time before the death of the father, Alba had pretended that grief for both recent deaths had been her motive in taking the girls so far from what was known and familiar.
For some strongly compelling reason, Alba had needed to remove herself and her sisters far from their home.
Alba was so terrified that someone from that home would come to Hawkenlye and recognise Berthe, working in the Vale, that she had been driven to that outrageous, violent reaction when thwarted.
A man who was known to have been to Walsingham had been murdered in the Vale.
And, although Berthe’s much-loved sister Meriel had gone missing, Berthe just didn’t seem too dreadfully anxious about it. .
Sister Euphemia appeared, carrying Josse’s midday meal. ‘She hasn’t tired you out, has she? Lovely lass she is, to be sure, but she is a bit of a talker.’ She put the trencher down on Josse’s lap.
‘She hasn’t tired me,’ Josse said. ‘I enjoy her chatter.’
‘Aye, she’s a breath of spring all right,’ the infirmarer agreed. ‘She has a gentle hand, too — she’s been helping me change the dressing on some of my less badly-afflicted patients, and they’ve all told me they prefer her touch to mine.’
‘I find that hard to believe, Sister,’ Josse said loyally.
‘Ah, it’s not the touch, Sir Josse, so much as the lively, pretty little face and the winning smile,’ Sister Euphemia said shrewdly. ‘Now, eat your meal while it’s hot!’
Josse went on thinking while he ate. But, try as he might, he could not tease out anything more from the assembled facts than what he had just concluded.
I have only half of the puzzle, he thought, reaching down to set the empty trencher on the floor and settling for the prescribed post-prandial nap. There will only be a chance of solving it when the other half is added.
And for that, he would have to wait until the Abbess returned.
Chapter Thirteen
Helewise returned to Hawkenlye in the evening of the first full day that Josse had spent out of bed.
He had awoken that morning with a strange certainty that today would be the day that the Abbess and her party came home, and he had been unshakeable in his determination to be sitting outside waiting when they rode through the gates. Not that the infirmarer had tried very hard to dissuade him; she could see for herself that lying fretting in bed would probably do him more harm than sitting outside in the sunshine.
After breakfast, he went — carefully — out through the infirmary door.
He was dismayed at how very slowly his strength was coming back. That alone made him face up to how ill he had been. Now that mental clarity was starting to return, he had been spending much time wondering how they were faring at New Winnowlands without him. Sister Euphemia had told him how Will and Sir Brice had brought him to Hawkenlye, and how they had stayed until reassured that he was out of danger; her words had moved him at the time to the ready tears of the invalid. Even now, when he was so much better, the thought of his manservant and his friend keeping vigil for him still had the power to touch him deeply.