The valedictory Mass began early and was briskly conducted, for the earl, once roused for departure, somehow conveyed the ardour of his mood to all those about him. When they came out into the early sunight the bustle of loading and saddling began at once. Out they came to the muster, Nicol the steward and his fellow from Ramsey, attendant on a morose and taciturn Herluin, still very loth to abandon his stray, but even more reluctant to linger, and miss this opportunity of a safe and comfortable passage half the way home, at least, and probably a mount for the rest of the way, since Robert Bossu could be generous to churchmen, even to one he cordially disliked.
The grooms came up from the stables with the narrow carriage that had conveyed Saint Winifred’s reliquary back to its home. Stripped now of the embroidered draperies which had graced it when it carried the saint, it would now serve as baggage wagon for all the party. Loaded with the earl’s belongings, and those of his squires, the alms collected by Herluin at Worcester and Evesham, and the greater part of Rémy’s instruments and possessions, which were compact enough, it could still accommodate Nicol and his companion, and not be too heavy a load for the horse. The packhorse which had carried the earl’s baggage on the outward journey was freed now to carry Herluin.
The two young squires led the saddled horses up from the stableyard, and Bénezet followed with Rémy’s mount and his own, with a young novice leading Daalny’s stolid cob bringing up the rear. The gate already stood wide for their passage. All done with competent speed. Cadfael, looking on from the corner of the cloister, had an eye anxiously on the open gate, for things had moved a little too briskly. It was early yet to expect Hugh and his officers, but no doubt the ceremonious farewells would take some time, and as yet the principals had not appeared. In all probability the earl would not think of setting out without taking his leave of Hugh.
The brothers had dispersed dutifully about their labours, but at every approach to the great court tended to linger rather longer than was strictly necessary, to contemplate the assembly of grooms and horses shifting restively about the cobbles, ready and eager to be on their way. The schoolboys were shooed away to their morning lesson, but Brother Paul would probably loose them again at the moment of departure.
Daalny, cloaked and bareheaded, came out from the guesthall and descended the steps to join the gathering below. She marked the balanced hang of Bénezet’s saddlebags, and knew the one that held his secrets by the rubbed graze she had noted on its front below the buckles. She watched it steadily, as Cadfael was watching her. Her face was pale; so it was always, she had skin white as magnolia, but now it had the drawn ice-pallor of stress over her slight, immaculate bones. Her eyes were half-hooded, but glitteringly fixed under the long dark lashes. Cadfael observed the signs of her tension and pain, and they grieved him, but he did not quite know how to interpret them. She had done what she set out to do, sent Tutilo out into a world better suited to him than the cloister. To come to terms with her inevitable daily world without him, after this brief fantasy, must cost her dear, there was no help for it. Having made his own plans, he failed to realize that she might still have plans of her own for a final cast, the one thing she still had left to do.
One of the young squires had returned to the guesthall to report that all was ready, and to carry cloak and gloves, or whatever was still left to be carried for his lord and his lord’s new retainer, who ranked, no doubt, somewhere among the lesser gentlefolk, well above the servants, but not reverenced like the harpers of Wales. And now they appeared in the doorway, and Abbot Radulfus, punctual with every courtesy, emerged from the garden of his lodging, between the still ragged and leggy rosebushes, at the same moment, with the prior at his back, and came to salute his departing guests.
The earl was plain and elegant as ever in his sombre colourings and fine fabrics, crimson cotte cut reasonably short for riding, and deep grey-blue surcoat slashed to the thigh fore and aft. He seldom covered his head unless against wind, rain or snow, but the capuchon swung and draped his higher shoulder, concealing the hump; though it was hard to believe that he ever gave any thought to such a device, for the flaw neither embarrassed him nor hampered the fluency of his movements. At his elbow came Rémy of Pertuis in full exultant spate, breathing spirited court converse into his patron’s ear. They descended the steps together, the squire following with his lord’s cloak over his arm. Below, the assembly was complete, for abbot and prior were waiting beside the horses.
“My lord,” said the earl, “I take my leave, now the time is come, with much regret. Your hospitality has been generous, and I fear very little deserved, since I came with pretensions to your saint. But I am glad that among many who covet her the lady knows how to choose the fittest and the best. I hope I take your blessing with me on the road?”
“With all my heart,” said Radulfus. “I have had much pleasure and profit in your company, my lord, and trust to enjoy it again when time favours us.”
The group, which had for a moment the formal look of immediate parting, began to dissolve into the general civility of visitors at the last moment reluctant to go, and lingering with many last things still to be said. There was Prior Robert at his most Norman and patrician, and even his most benign, since events had finally turned out well; certainly he was unlikely to let go of a Norman earl without exercising to the last moment his eloquence and charm. There was Herluin, in no very expansive mood but not to be left out of the courtesies, and Rémy, delighted with his change of fortune, shedding his beams impartially on all. Cadfael, with long experience of such departures, was aware that it would go on for as much as a quarter of an hour before anyone actually set foot in the stirrup and made to mount.
Daalny, with no such assurance, expected haste. She could not afford to wait, and find she had waited too long. She had steeled herself to the act, and dreaded she might not have time to make good what she had to say. She approached as close to abbot and earl as was seemly, and in the first pause between them she stepped forward and said loudly and clearly: “Father Abbot, my lord Robert, may I speak a word? Before we leave this place, I have something that must be said, for it bears on theft, and may even bear on murder. I beg you hear me, and do right, for it is too much for me, and I dare not let it pass and be put aside.”
Everyone heard, and all eyes turned upon her. There fell a silence, of curiosity, of astonishment, of disapproval that the least of all these gathered here should dare to ask for a hearing now, out of a clear sky, and publicly. Yet strangely, no one waved her away or frowned her to silence and humility. She saw both abbot and earl regarding her with sharply arrested interest, and she made a deep reverence for them to share between them. Thus far she had said nothing to make any man afraid or uneasy for himself, not even Bénezet, who stood lounging with an arm over his horse’s neck, the saddlebag hard against his side. Whatever lance she held she had not yet aimed, but Cadfael saw her purpose and was dismayed.
“Father, may I speak?”
This was the abbot’s domain. The earl left it to him to respond.
“I think,” said Radulfus, “that you must. You have said two words that have been heavy on our minds these past days, theft and murder. If there is anything you have to tell concerning these, we must listen.”
Cadfael, standing aside with an anxious eye on the gate, and praying that Hugh might ride in now, at once, with three or four sound men at his back, cast an uneasy glance at Bénezet. The man had not moved, but though his face remained merely a mask of interested but impersonal curiosity, much like all the others, the eyes fixed intently upon Daalny’s face were levelled like the points of two daggers, and his very immobility seemed now deliberate and braced, a hound pointing.