Josse shrugged.
‘And all the while he planned to kill her for her infidelity?’
After a short pause he said, ‘It is possible.’
And she had to admit that he was right.
He announced that he would set out for Deadfall that afternoon. He did not expect to reach his destination that day but, as he said, it was ideal weather for sleeping out under the stars and he looked forward to doing so. Helewise, watching him, wondered if the decision was so as to ensure that he reached Deadfall in the bright light of morning rather than late at night. Well, if the very name of the place truly held dread for him, then he was, she decided stoutly, brave to go there at all, never mind by night.
She came to the gates to see him on his way and, as she had done so many times before, wished him God’s speed and safe return.
Watching Horace’s dust slowly circling in the warm, still air, she had the sudden rebellious thought: I should be the one to ride out! The girl died here, in the Abbey over which I have charge. It should be I who informs the relatives and who uses my eyes and my wits to discover the truth. But yet I stay here, and I send others to act for me.
For a wild moment she thought of calling out, Wait, Sir Josse! Wait while I have the golden mare saddled, because I’m coming with you!
But time passed, and she did not.
When the dust had settled and there remained no sign to tell of Josse’s passing, she turned and walked slowly back to her room.
In the late afternoon, Sister Ursel tapped on the door to tell her that Brother Saul and Brother Augustus had returned. They had ridden hard, she reported, and were washing off the dust and sweat of their journey before presenting themselves to their Abbess.
‘They have indeed ridden hard!’ Helewise exclaimed, ‘for they have been to Ryemarsh, carried out their mission there, presumably, and returned, all in little over a day!’
She did not say so to Sister Ursel — who had been known to speculate quite wildly enough without anyone actually encouraging her to do so — but it occurred straight away to Helewise that Saul and Augustus must have something important to tell her to have made such haste to come back to Hawkenlye …
She dismissed the porteress and then sat with outward serenity while she waited. Inside, however, her mind seethed with questions and possibilities. Disciplining her thoughts was difficult but not, she discovered, impossible; by the time the two brothers arrived — both wearing clean robes and with wet hair — her outward poise was reflected by inner silence.
She accepted their reverences with a brief inclination of her head and then said calmly, ‘What did you find at Ryemarsh?’
Saul and Augustus exchanged a glance and then Saul said, ‘We rode up at dusk, my lady. We feared we were too late to seek admission and were planning to find a sheltered spot to camp out till morning but there was a manservant out in the courtyard doing me locking-up round and he heard us.’
‘Suspicious sort, he was,’ Augustus put in. ‘Picked up a pitchfork when he caught sight of us and brandished it in our direction while he challenged us.’
‘He did,’ Saul agreed, ‘but he calmed down when we told him who we were.’
‘By then he’d caught sight of the habit we wear,’ Augustus put in. ‘He reckoned he’d less to fear from his visitors than he’d thought.’
Helewise smiled. Augustus was probably right; the habit of religion did tend to disarm people. ‘Then he invited you inside?’ she prompted.
‘Aye,’ Saul said. ‘We said we were from the Abbey with news from their master, the lord Ambrose, and that it was bad tidings.’ He exchanged a look with Augustus and went on, ‘It was strange, my lady, because the old servant and the woman who was in the kitchen both seemed very worried even before we told them about the poor young lady.’
‘I see.’ She would, she decided, return to that remark in a moment. First she asked, ‘How did they react to the news of Galiena’s death?’
‘They were most distressed,’ Augustus said. ‘No doubt about it, was there, Saul?’ Saul shook his head sadly. ‘They loved her, my lady, that’s for sure, and they were genuinely heartbroken to know she was dead.’
‘Did you-’ She paused, thinking how to phrase her question tactfully. ‘Were you able to gain any impression of how the household servants viewed their master and mistress? Did they, would you say, think that Ambrose and his wife were happy?’
‘Without a doubt,’ Saul assured her. ‘They said she made the sun shine for him, which I imagine you’d readily understand, what with her being so young and pretty. But they insisted that she cared for him deeply too, even though he was so much older.’ He turned to the younger man. ‘Wouldn’t you say so, Gussie?’
Augustus nodded enthusiastically. ‘Aye. The old kitchen woman said she — Galiena — had been a shy girl when she came to Ryemarsh as the lord Ambrose’s wife, and they all jumped to the conclusion that she was an unwilling bride. But they had to accept they’d been wrong because she blossomed, according to the manservant, and turned from someone who was reserved with them and hardly spoke into a happy and outgoing young girl who made the sap rise in old Ambrose and only needed a baby or two to complete her happiness.’ Saul dug him in the ribs and he said, with some indignation, ‘Saul, I’m only repeating what they said!’
‘It’s all right, Brother Saul,’ Helewise said. ‘After all, I did ask you to report anything that struck you as relevant.’ There was something else that she was very keen to know; again taking a moment to word her question, she said, ‘And what of visitors? Did they entertain family or friends? Were there any that came regularly?’
‘The lord Ambrose doesn’t have kin, they’re all dead.’ Augustus spoke matter-of-factly. ‘The lady went visiting her folks at Readingbrooke from time to time, often with the lord Ambrose, and the family there would return the visits. She had several sisters, they told us, and an aunt to whom she was devoted who has young children of her own. The family’s a close one, it seems.’
‘I see.’ No need, Helewise decided, to reveal the details of Galiena’s adoption by the family at Readingbrooke. ‘Anyone else?’
‘Well, that neighbour of theirs, from Rotherbridge,’ Saul said. ‘He’s a friend of the lord Ambrose and calls by when he’s passing.’
‘I see,’ she said again, trying hard not to let her sudden excitement show in her voice. ‘And the household — er — they liked all these visitors?’
She knew even as she spoke that the question was absurd. Both Saul and Augustus looked surprised and Augustus, more forthright than Saul, said, ‘I don’t see as how it was for them to have likes or dislikes, my lady, since they’re servants and do as they’re told.’ His comment — possibly a little forthright for a young lay brother addressing his Abbess, but entirely justified, Helewise thought — earned him another dig in the ribs and, casting down his eyes, he muttered, ‘Sorry, my lady.’
‘It’s all right,’ she said. She could not see a way to find out what she needed to know other than a direct question so, after a moment, she asked it. ‘Did you receive the impression,’ she said carefully, ‘that there was any gossip concerning Sir Brice and Galiena? Oh, I know what you said about Galiena being so devoted to her husband, but you both know how servants love to chatter!’ She gave what even to her sounded a totally unconvincing little laugh.
Saul and Augustus looked at each other, then back at her. Then, in unison, they shook their heads and said firmly, ‘Oh, no.’ Augustus added, as if for emphasis, ‘There wasn’t anything like that. Was there, Saul?’
And Saul said, ‘No.’
Well, she thought, that was not necessarily relevant. After all, if Josse had been right and Brice had been Galiena’s lover, he’d hardly have ridden up to the door proclaiming it to the world.