St. Peter's Fair (16 page)

“Martin
has brought the coffin. They are within there, she’ll think of nothing else
now. But, Cadfael, she intends to give us all the slip when she can. She has
tried. She would see, she said, if the glover at the fair has something to take
the place of the ones she lost. But when I said I would go with her, no, that
would not do, she gave up the idea.”

“Gloves!”
murmured Brother Cadfael, scrubbing thoughtfully at his chin. “Strange, when
you think of it, that it should be gloves she has on her mind, in the middle of
summer.”

Aline
was in no position to follow that thought, she took it at its surface meaning.
“Why strange? We know there were some stolen from her, and here we are at one
of the few fairs where rare goods are to be bought, it follows naturally
enough. But of course the glover is only a handy excuse.”

Cadfael
said no more then, but he went away very thoughtfully towards the cloister. The
strange thing was not that a girl should want to replace, while chance offered,
a lost piece of finery. It was rather that when she was suddenly confronted by
the need to pass off as simple robbery a raid she knew to be something very
different, one of the articles she claimed to have lost should be a thing so
inappropriate to the season that she felt obliged to account for it by saying
she had newly bought it in Gloucester on the journey. Why gloves, unless she
had gloves running in her mind already for another reason? Gloves? Or glovers?

In
the transept chapel Martin Bellecote and his young son set up the heavy coffin
on a draped trestle, and reverently laid the body of Master Thomas of Bristol
within it. Emma stood looking down at her uncle’s dead face for a long time,
without tears or words. It would not be painful, she found, to remember him
thus, dignified and remote in death, the bones of his
cheeks
and brow and jaw more strongly outlined than in life, his florid flesh
contracted and paled into waxen austerity. Now at the last moment she wanted to
give him something to take with him into his grave, and realised that in the
buffeting of these two days she had not been able to think clearly enough to be
ready for the parting. Not the fact of death, but the absolute need of some
ceremonial tenderness, separate from the public rites, suddenly seemed to her
overwhelmingly important.

“Shall
I cover him?” asked Martin Bellecote gently.

Even
so soft a sound startled her. She looked round almost wonderingly. The man,
large, comely and calm, waited her orders without impatience. The boy, grave
and silent, watched her with huge hazel eyes. From her four years’ superiority
over him she pondered whether so young a creature should be doing this office,
and then she understood that those eyes were preoccupied rather with her living
self than with the dead, and the vigorous, flowing sap in him reached up
towards light and life as to the sun, and recognised shadow only by virtue of
its neighbouring brightness. That was right and good.

“No,
wait just a moment,” she said. “I’ll come back!”

She
went quickly out into the sunlight, and looked about her for the path that led
into the gardens. The green lines of a hedge and the crowns of trees within
drew her, she came into a walk where flowers had been planted. The brothers
were great gardeners, and valued food crops for good reason, but they had time
also for roses. She chose the one bush that bore a bloom like no other, pale
yellow petals shading into rose at the tips, and plucked one flower only. Not
the buds, not even the one perfect globe, but a wide-open bloom just beyond its
prime but still unflawed. She took it back, hurrying, into the church with her.
He was not young, not even at his zenith, but settling into his autumn, and
this was the rose for him.

Brother
Cadfael had watched her go, he watched her come again, and followed her into
the chapel, but held aloof in the shadows. She brought her single flower and
laid it in the coffin, beside the dead man’s heart.

“Cover
him now,” she said, and stood well back to let them work in peace. When it was
done, she thanked them,
and they withdrew and left her there, as
clearly was her wish. So, just as silently, did Brother Cadfael.

Emma
remained kneeling on the stones of the transept, unaware of discomfort, a great
while, her eyes wide open all that time upon the closed coffin, on its draped
stand before the altar. To lie thus in the church of a great abbey, to have a
special Mass sung for him, and then to be taken home in a grand coffin for
burial with still further rites, surely that was glory, and he would have liked
it. All was to be done as he would have liked. All! He would be pleased with
her.

She
knew her duty; she said prayers for him, a great many prayers, because the form
was blessedly laid down, and her mind could range while her lips formed the
proper words. She would do what he had wanted done, what he had half-confided
to her, as he had to no other. She would see his task completed, and he would
rest, pleased with her. And then… she had hardly looked beyond, but there was a
great, summer-scented breeze blowing through her spirit, telling her she was young
and fair, and wealthy into the bargain, and that boys like the coffin-maker’s
young son looked upon her with interest and pleasure. Other young men, too, of
less green years…

She
rose from her knees at last, shook out her crumpled skirts, and walked briskly
out of the chapel into the nave of the church, and founding the clustered stone
pillars at the corner of the crossing, came face to face with Ivo Corbière.

He
had been waiting, silent and motionless, in his shadowy corner, refraining even
from setting foot in the chapel until her vigil was over, and the resolution
with which she had suddenly ended it flung her almost into his arms. She
uttered a startled gasp, and he put out reassuring hands to steady her, and was
in no haste to let go. In this dim place his gold head showed darkened to
bronze, and his face, stooped over her solicitously, was so gilded by the
summer that it had almost the same fine-metal burnishing.

“Did
I alarm you? I’m sorry! I didn’t want to disturb you. They told me at the
gatehouse that the master-carpenter had come and gone, and you were here. I
hoped if I waited patiently I might be able to talk with you. If I have not
pressed my attentions on you until now,” he said earnestly, “it is not because
I haven’t thought of you. Constantly!”

Her eyes were raised to his face with a fascinated
admiration she would never have indulged in full light, and she quite forgot to
make any move to withdraw herself from his hold. His hands slid down her
forearms, but halted at her hands, and the touch, by mutual consent, became a
clasp.

“Almost
two days since I’ve spoken with you!” he said. “It’s an age, and I’ve grudged
it, but you were well-friended, and I had no right… But now that I have you,
let me keep you for an hour! Come out and walk in the gardens. I doubt if
you’ve even seen them yet.”

They
went out together into the sunlight, through the cloister garth and out into
the bustle and traffic of the great court. It was almost time for Vespers, the
quietest hours of the afternoon now spent, the brothers gathering gradually
from their dispersed labours, guests returning from the fairground and the
riverside. It was a gratifying thing to walk through this populous place on the
arm of a nobleman, lord of a modest honour scattered through Cheshire and
Shropshire. For the daughter of craftsmen and merchants, a very gratifying
thing! They sat down on a stone bench in the flower-garden, on the sunny side
of the pleached hedge, with the heady fragrance of Brother Cadfael’s herbarium
wafted to them in drunken eddies on a soft breeze.

“You
will have troublesome dispositions to make,” said Corbière seriously. “If there
is anything I can arrange for you, let me know of it. It will be my pleasure to
serve you. You are taking him back to Bristol for burial?”

“It’s
what he would have wished. There will be a Mass for him in the morning, and
then we shall carry him back to his barge for the journey home. The brothers
have been kindness itself to me.”

“And
you? Will you also return with the barge?”

She
hesitated, but why not confide in him? He was considerate and kind, and quick
to understand. “No, it would be— unwise. While my uncle lived it was very well,
but without him it would not do. There is one of our men—I must say no evil of
him, for he has done none, but… He is too fond. Better we should not travel
together. But neither do I want to offer him insult, by letting him know he is
not quite trusted. I’ve told him that I must remain here a few days, that I may
be needed if the sheriff has more questions to ask, or more is
found out about my uncle’s death.”

“But
then,” said Ivo with warm concern, “what of your own journey home? How will you
manage?”

“I
shall stay with Lady Beringar until we can find some safe party riding south,
with women among them. Hugh Beringar will advise me. I have money, and I can
pay my way. I shall manage.”

He
looked at her long and earnestly, until his gravity melted into a smile.
“Between all your well-wishers, you will certainly reach your home without
mishap. I’ll be giving my mind to it, among the rest. But now let’s forget, for
my sake, that there must be a departure, and make the most of the hours while
you are still here.” He rose, and took her by the hand to draw her up with him.
“Forget Vespers, forget we’re guests of an abbey, forget the fair and the
business of the fair, and all that such things may demand of you in future.
Think only that it’s summer, and a glorious evening, and you’re young, and have
friends… Come down with me past the fish-ponds, as far as the brook. That is
all abbey land, I wouldn’t take you beyond.”

She
went with him gratefully, his hand cool and vital in hers. By the brook below
the abbey fields it was cool and fresh and bright, full of scintillating light
along the water, and birds dabbling and singing, and in the pleasure of the
moment she almost forgot all that lay upon her, so sacred and so burdensome.
Ivo was reverent and gentle, and did not press her too close, but when she said
regretfully that it was time for her to go back, for fear Aline might be
anxious about her, he went with her all the way, her hand still firmly retained
in his, and presented himself punctiliously before Aline, so that Emma’s
present guardian might study, accept and approve him. As indeed she did.

It
was charmingly and delicately done. He made himself excellent company for as
long as was becoming on a first visit, invited and deferred to all Aline’s
graceful questions, and withdrew well before he had even drawn near the end of
his welcome.

“So
that’s the young man who was so helpful and gallant when the riot began,” said
Aline, when he was gone. “Do
you know, Emma, I do believe you
have a serious admirer there.” A wooer gained, she thought, might come as a
blessed counter-interest to a guardian lost. “He comes of good blood and
family,” said the Aline Siward who had brought two manors to her husband in her
own right, but saw no difference between her guest and herself, and innocently
ignored the equally proud and honourable standards of those born to craft and
commerce instead of land. “The Corbières are distant kin of Earl Ranulf of
Chester himself. And he does seem a most estimable young man.”

“But
not of my kind,” said Emma, as shrewd and wary as she sounded regretful. “I am
a stone-mason’s daughter, and niece to a merchant. No landed lord is likely to
become a suitor for someone like me.”

“But
it’s not someone like you in question,” said Aline reasonably. “It is you!”

Brother
Cadfael looked about him, late in the evening after Compline, saw all things in
cautious balance, Emma securely settled in the guest-hall, Beringar already
home. He went thankfully to bed with his brothers, for once at the proper time,
and slept blissfully until the bell rang to wake him for Matins. Down the night
stairs and into the church the brothers filed in the midnight silence, to begin
the new day’s worship. In the faint light of the altar candles they took their
places, and the third day of Saint Peter’s Fair had begun. The third and last.

Cadfael
always rose for Matins and Lauds not sleepy and unwilling, but a degree more
awake than at any other time, as though his senses quickened to the sense of
separateness of the community gathered here, to a degree impossible by
daylight. The dimness of the light, the solidity of the enclosing shadows, the
muted voices, the absence of lay worshippers, all contributed to his sense of
being enfolded in a sealed haven, where all those who shared in it were his own
flesh and blood and spirit, responsible for him as he for them, even some for
whom, in the active and arduous day, he could feel no love, and pretended none.
The burden of his vows became also his privilege, and the night’s first worship
was the fuel of the next day’s energy.

So
the shadows had sharp edges for him, the shapes of
pillar and capital
and arch clamoured like vibrant notes of music, both vision and hearing
observed with heightened sensitivity, details had a quivering insistence.
Brother Mark’s profile against the candle-light was piercingly clear. A note
sung off-key by a sleepy elder stung like a bee. And the single pale speck
lying under the trestle that supported Master Thomas’s coffin was like a hole
in reality, something that could not be there. Yet it persisted. It was at the
beginning of Lauds that it first caught his eye, and after that he could not
get free of it. Wherever he looked, however he fastened upon the altar, he
could still see it out of the corner of his eye.