An Excellent Mystery (10 page)

To
which sensible notion they both said yes, and Nicholas recovered a little of
his spirits, if nothing could restore the ardour with which he had ridden north
from Winchester.

What
did somewhat surprise Brother Cadfael was the considerate way in which Fidelis,
confronted yet again with this visitant from the time before he had known
Humilis and established his own intimacy with him, withdrew himself from sight
as he was withdrawn from the possibility of conversation, and left them to
their shared memories of travel, Crusade and battle, things so far removed from
his own experience. An affection which could so self-effacingly make room for a
rival and prior affection was generous indeed.

There
was a merchant of Shrewsbury who dealt in fleeces all up and down the borders,
both from Wales and from such fat sheep-country as the Cotswolds, and had done
an interesting side-trade in information, for Hugh’s benefit, in these contrary
times. His active usefulness was naturally confined to this period of high
summer when the wool clip was up for sale, and many dealers had restricted
their movements in these dangerous times, but he was a determined man, intrepid
enough to venture well south down the border, towards territory held by the
empress. His suppliers had sold to him for some years, and had sufficient
confidence in him to hold their clip until he made contact.

He
had good trading relations as far afield as Bruges in Flanders, and was not at
all averse to a large risk when calculating on a still larger profit. Moreover,
he took his own risks, rather than delegating these unchancy journeys to his
underlings. Possibly he even relished the challenge, for he was a stubborn and
stalwart man.

Now,
in early September, he was on his way home with his purchases, a train of three
wagons following from Buckingham, which was as near as he could reasonably go
to Oxford. For Oxford had become as alert and nervous as a town itself under
siege, every day expecting that the empress must be forced by starvation to
retreat from Winchester. The merchant had left his men secure on a road
relatively peaceful, to bring up his wagons at leisure, and himself rode ahead
at good speed with his news to report to Hugh Beringar in Shrewsbury, even
before he went home to his wife and family.

“My
lord, things move at last. I had it from a man who saw the end of it, and made
good haste away to a safer place. You know how they were walled up there in
their castles in Winchester, the bishop and the empress, with the queen’s
armies closing all round the city and sealing off the roads. No supplies have
gone in through that girdle for four weeks now, and they say there’s starvation
in the town, though I doubt if either empress or bishop is going short.” He was
a man who spoke his mind, and no great respecter of high personages. “A very
different tale for the poor townsfolk! But it’s biting even the garrison within
there at the royal castle, for the queen has been supplying Wolvesey while she
starves out the opposing side. Well, they came to the point where they must try
to win a way through.”

“I’ve
been expecting it,” said Hugh, intent. “What did they hit on? They could only
hope to move north or west, the queen holds all the south-east.”

“They
sent out a force, three or four hundred as I heard it, northwards, to seize on
the town of Wherwell, and try to secure a base there to open the Andover road.
Whether they were seen on the move, or whether some townsman betrayed them —
for they’re not loved in Winchester — however it was, William of Ypres and the
queen’s men closed in on them when they’d barely reached the edge of the town,
and cut them to pieces. A. great killing! The fellow who told me fled when the
houses started to burn, but he saw the remnant of the empress’s men put up a
desperate fight of it and reach the great nunnery there. And they never
scrupled to use it, either, he says. They swarmed into the church itself and
turned it into a fortress, although the poor sisters had shut themselves in
there for safety. The Flemings threw in firebrands after them. A hellish
business it must have been. He could hear from far off as he ran, he said, the
women screaming, the flames crackling and the din of fighting within there,
until those who remained were forced to come out and surrender, half-scorched
as they were. Not a man can have escaped either death or capture.”

“And
the women?” demanded Hugh aghast. “Do you tell me the abbey of Wherwell is
burned down, like the convent in the city, like Hyde Mead after it?”

“My
man never dallied to see how much was left,” said the messenger drily. “But
certainly the church burned down to the ground, with both men and women in it —
the sisters cannot all have come out alive. And as for those who did, God alone
knows where they will have found refuge now. Safe places are hard to find in
those parts. And for the empress’s garrison, I’d say there’s no hope for them
now but to muster every man they have, and try to burst out by force of numbers
through the ring, and run for it. And a poor chance for them, even so.”

A
poor chance indeed, after this last loss of three or four hundred fighting men,
probably hand-picked for the exploit, which must have been a desperate gamble
from the first. The year only at early September, and the fortunes of war had
changed and changed again, from the disastrous battle of Lincoln which had made
the king prisoner and brought the empress within grasp of the crown itself, to
this stranglehold drawn round the same proud lady now. Now only give us the
empress herself prisoner, thought Hugh, and we shall have stalemate, recover
each our sovereign, and begin this whole struggle all over again, for what
sense there is in it! And at the cost of the brothers of Hyde Mead and the nuns
of Wherwell. Among many others even more defenceless, like the poor of
Winchester.

The
name of Wherwell, as yet, meant no more to him than any other convent unlucky
enough to fall into the field of battle.

“A
good year for me, all the same,” said the wool-merchant, rising to make his way
home to his own waiting board and bed. “The clip measures up well, it was worth
the journey.”

Hugh
took the latest news down to the abbey next morning, immediately after Prime,
for whatever of import came to his ears was at once conveyed to Abbot Radulfus,
a service the abbot appreciated and reciprocated. The clerical and secular
authorities worked well together in Shropshire, and moreover, in this case a
Benedictine house had been desecrated and destroyed, and those of the Rule
stood together, and helped one another where they could. Even in more peaceful
times, nunneries were apt to have much narrower lands and more restricted
resources than the houses of the monks, and often had to depend upon brotherly
alms, even under good, shrewd government. Now here was total devastation.
Bishops and abbots would be called upon to give aid.

He
had come from his colloquy with Radulfus in the abbot’s parlour with half an
hour still before High Mass and, choosing to stay for the celebration since he
was here, he did what he habitually did with time to spare within the precinct
of the abbey and went looking for Brother Cadfael in his workshop in the
herb-garden.

Cadfael
had been up since long before Prime, inspected such wines and distillations as
he had working, and done a little watering while the soil was in shade and
cooled from the night. At this time of year, with the harvest in, there was
little work to be done among the herbs, and he had no need as yet to ask for an
assistant in place of Brother Oswin.

When
Hugh came to look for Cadfael he found him sitting at ease on the bench under
the north wall, which at this time of day was pleasantly warm without being too
hot, contemplating between admiration and regret the roses that bloomed with
such extravagant splendour and wilted so soon. Hugh sat down beside him,
rightly interpreting placid silence as welcome.

“Aline
says it’s high time you came to see how your godson has grown.”

“I
know well enough how much he will have grown,” said Giles Beringar’s godfather,
between complacency and awe of his formidable responsibility. “Not two years
old until Christmas, and too heavy already for an old man.”

Hugh
made a derisive noise. When Cadfael claimed to be an old man he must either be
up to something, or inclined to be idle, and giving fair warning.

“Every
time he sees me he climbs me like a tree,” said Cadfael dreamily. “You he
daren’t treat so, you are but a sapling. Give him fifteen more years, and he’ll
make two of you.”

“So
he will,” agreed the fond father, and stretched his lithe, light body
pleasurably in the strengthening sun. “A long lad from birth — do you remember?
That was a Christmas indeed, what with my son — and yours… I wonder where
Olivier is now? Do you know?”

“How
should I know? With d’Angers in Gloucester, I hope. She can’t have drawn them
all into Winchester with her, she must leave force enough in the west to hold
her on to her base there. Why, what made you think of him just now?”

“It
did enter my head that he might have been among the empress’s chosen at
Wherwell.” He had recoiled into grim recollection, and did not at first notice
how Cadfael stiffened and turned to stare. “I pray you’re right, and he’s well
out of it.”

“At
Wherwell? Why, what of Wherwell?”

“I
forgot,” said Hugh, startled, “you don’t yet know the latest news, for I’ve
only just brought it within here, and I got it only last night. Did I not say
they’d have to try to break out — the empress’s men? They have tried it,
Cadfael, disastrously for them. They sent a picked force to try to seize
Wherwell, no doubt hoping to straddle the road and the river there, and open a
way to bring in supplies. William of Ypres cut them to pieces outside the town,
and the remnant fled into the nunnery and shut themselves into the church. The
place burned down over them… God forgive them for ever violating it, but they
were Maud’s men who first did it, not ours. The nuns, God help them, had taken
refuge there when the fight began…”

Cadfael
sat frozen even in the sunlight. “Do you tell me Wherwell has gone the way of
Hyde?”

“Burned
to the ground. The church at least. As for the rest… But in so hot and dry a
season…”

Cadfael,
who had gripped him hard and suddenly by the arm, as abruptly loosed him,
leaped from the bench, and began to run, veritably to run, as he had not done
since hurtling to get out of range from the rogue castle on Titterstone Clee,
two years earlier. He had still a very respectable turn of speed when roused,
but his gait was wonderful, legless under the habit, like a black ball rolling,
with a slight oscillation from side to side, a seaman’s walk become a headlong
run. And Hugh, who loved him, and rose to pursue him with a very sharp sense of
the urgency behind this flight, nevertheless could not help laughing as he ran.
Viewed from behind, a Benedictine in a hurry, and a Benedictine of more than
sixty years and built like a barrel, at that, may be formidably impressive to
one who knows him, but must be comic.

Cadfael’s
purposeful flight checked in relief as he emerged into the great court; for
they were there still, in no haste with their farewells, though the horse stood
by with a groom at his bridle, and Brother Fidelis tightening the straps that
held Nicholas Harnage’s bundle and rolled cloak behind the saddle. They knew
nothing yet of any need for haste. There was a whole sunlit day before the
rider.

Fidelis
wore the cowl always outdoors, as though to cover a personal shyness that
stemmed, surely, from his mute tongue. He who could not open his mind to others
shrank from claiming any privileged advance from them. Only Humilis had some
manner of silent and eloquent speech with him that needed no voice. Having
secured the saddle-roll the young man stepped back modestly to a little
distance, and waited.

Cadfael
arrived more circumspectly than he had set out from the garden. Hugh had not
followed him so closely, but halted in shadow by the wall of the guest-hall.

There’s
news,” said Cadfael bluntly. “You should hear it before you leave us. The
empress has made an attack on the town of Wherwell, a disastrous attack. Her
force is wiped out by the queen’s army. But in the fighting the abbey of
Wherwell was fired, the church burned to the ground. I know no more detail, but
so much is certain. The sheriff here got the word last night.”

“By
a reliable man,” said Hugh, drawing close. “It’s certain.”

Nicholas
stood staring, eyes and mouth wide, his golden sunburn dulling to an earthen
grey as the blood drained from beneath it. He got out in a creaking whisper:
“Wherwell? They’ve dared…?”

“No
daring,” said Hugh ruefully, “but plain terror. They were men penned in, the
raiding party, they sought any place of hiding they could find, surely, and
slammed to the door. But the end was the same, whoever tossed in the
firebrands. The abbey’s laid waste. Sorry I am to say it.”

“And
the women…? Oh, God… Julian’s there… Is there any word of the women?”

“They’d
taken to the church for sanctuary,” said Hugh. In such civil warfare there were
no sanctuaries, not even for women and children. “The remnant of the raiders
surrendered — most may have come out alive. All, I doubt.”