The Raven in the Foregate (28 page)

“In all fairness,” said Hugh thoughtfully, “it would
have been a very delicate matter to reject a priest recommended by the papal
legate, even for a man of your abbot’s stature. And the fellow was impressive
to the eye and the ear, and had scholarship… No wonder Radulfus thought he was
bringing you a treasure. God send you a decent, humble, common man next time.”

“Amen! Whether he has Latin or not! And here am I the
well-wisher, if not the accomplice, of an enemy of the King, criminal as well
as sinner! Did I say I was being obliged to search my conscience? But not too
diligently—that always leads to trouble.”

“I wonder,” said Hugh, smiling indulgently into the
glow of the brazier, “if they’ll have set out yet?”

“Not until dark, I fancy. Overnight they’ll be gone. I
hope she has somehow left word for Ralph Giffard,” said Cadfael, considering.
“He’s no bad man, only driven, as so many are now, and mainly for his son. She
had no complaint of him, except that he had compounded with fortune, and given
up his hopes for the Empress. Being more than thirty years short of his age,
she finds that incomprehensible. But you and I, Hugh, can comprehend it all too
well. Let the young ones go their own gait, and find their own way.”

He sat smiling, thinking of the pair of them, but
chiefly of Ninian, lively and bold and impudent, and a stout performer with the
spade, even though he had never had one in his hand before, and had to learn
the craft quickly. “I never had such a stout-hearted labourer under me here
since Brother John—that must be nearly five years now! The one who stayed in
Gwytherin, and married the smith’s niece. He’ll have made a doughty smith
himself by now. Benet reminded me of him, some ways… all or nothing, and ready
for every venture.”

“Ninian,” said Hugh, correcting him almost absently.

“True, Ninian we must call him now, but I tend to
forget. But I haven’t told you,” said Cadfael, kindling joyfully to the
recollection, “the very best of the ending. In the middle of so much
aggravation and suspicion and death, a joke is no bad thing.”

“I wouldn’t say no to that,” agreed Hugh, leaning
forward to mend the fire with a few judiciously placed pieces of charcoal, with
the calculated pleasure of one for whom such things are usually done by others.
“But I saw very little sign of one today. Where did you find it?”

“Why, you were kept busy talking with Father Abbot,
close by the grave, while the rest were dispersing. You had no chance to
observe it. But I was loose, and so was Brother Jerome, with his nose twitching
for officious mischief, as usual. Sanan saw it,” said Cadfael, with fond
recollection. “It scared the wits out of her for a moment or two, but then it
was all resolved. You know, Hugh, how wide those double doors of ours are, in
the wall…”

“I came that way,” said Hugh patiently, a little
sleepy with relief from care, the fumes of the brazier, and the early start to
a day now subsiding into a dim and misty evening. “I know!”

“There was a young fellow holding a horse, out there
in the Foregate. Who was to notice him until everyone began streaming out by that
way? Jerome was running like a sheep-dog about the fringes, hustling them out,
he was bound to take a frequent look out there to the streets. He saw a man he
thought he recognised, and went closer to view, all panting with fervour and
zeal—you know him!”

“Every uncoverer of evil acquires merit,” said Hugh,
taking idle pleasure in the mild satire upon Brother Jerome. “What merit could
there be for him there, in a lad holding a horse?”

“Why, one Benet, or Ninian, hunted as recreant to our
lord King Stephen, and denounced to our lord sheriff—saving your presence,
Hugh, but you know you were just confirmed in office, you mean more now to
Brother Jerome than ever before!—by Ralph Giffard, no less. That is what Jerome
saw, barring that the malefactor did seem to be wearing clothes never seen on
him before.”

“Now you do surprise me,” said Hugh, turning a
gleaming and amused face upon his friend. “And this really was the said Benet
or Ninian?”

“It was indeed. I knew him, and so did Sanan when she
looked ahead, where Jerome was looking, and saw him there. The lad himself,
Hugh, bold as ever to plunge his head into whatever snare. Come to make sure
himself where the blame was flying, and see that none of it fell upon his
nurse. God knows what he would have done, if you had not carolled aloud your
preference for Jordan. After all, what did he know of all that happened after
he came panting into the church, that night? It could have been Jordan, for all
he knew. No doubt he believed it was, once you bayed the quarry.”

“I have a fine, bell-mouthed bay,” acknowledged Hugh,
grinning. “And just as well Father Abbot kept me talking and would have me stay
and dine with him, or I might have run my nose full into this madcap lad of
yours, and just as Jerome plucked him by the hood. So how did all this end? I
heard no foray in the Foregate.”

“There was none,” agreed Cadfael complacently. “Ralph
Giffard was there among the crowd, did you never see him? He’s tall enough to
top most of the Foregate folk. But there, you were held fast in the middle, no
time to look about you. He was there. At the end he turned to go, not worst
pleased, I fancy, that you had no hold on the lad he’d felt obliged to hand to
you earlier. It was good to see, Hugh! He shouldered past Jerome, having legs so
much longer, just as our most eager hound had his nose down on a hot scent. And
he took the bridle from the lad’s hand, and even smiled at him, eye to eye, and
the lad held his stirrup for him and steadied him astride, as good a groom as
ever you saw. And Jerome baulked like a hound at a loss, and came scuttling
back, aghast that he’d as good as howled accusation at Giffard’s own groom,
waiting honestly for his master. That was when I saw Sanan shudder into such
laughter as might almost have broken her apart, but that she’s very sturdily
made, that lady! And Giffard rode away, back along the Foregate, and the groom
that was no groom of his went trotting after him afoot, out of sight and away.”

“And this verily happened?” demanded Hugh.

“Son, I saw it. I shall cherish it. Off they went, and
Ralph Giffard threw a silver penny to young Ninian, and Ninian caught it and
went on his way round the corner and out of sight, before he stopped for
breath. And still does not know, I suppose,” said Cadfael, peering through the
doorway into a late afternoon light that still lacked an hour or so to Vespers,
“still does not know to whom he owes his salvation. How I would love to be by,
when Sanan tells him to whom he owes his fat pay for less than an hour of
holding a horse! I wager that lad will never part with that penny, he’ll have
it pierced for his neck or for hers. There are not many such keepsakes,” said
Cadfael smugly, “in one lifetime.”

“Are you telling me,” said Hugh, delighted,”that those
two met so and parted so, in mutual service, and had no notion with whom they
dealt?”

“No notion in the world! They had exchanged messages,
they were allies, adversaries, friends, enemies, what you please, in the most
intimate degree,” said Cadfael, with deep and grateful contentment, “but
neither of them had the least idea what the other one looked like. They had
never once set eyes on each other.”

About
the Author

ELLIS PETERS is
the
nom-de-crime
of English novelist Edith Pargeter, author of scores of
books under her own name. She is the recipient of the Silver Dagger Award,
conferred by the Crime Writers Association in Britain, as well as the coveted
Edgar, awarded by the Mystery Writers of America. Miss Pargeter is also well
known as a translator of poetry and prose from the Czech and has been awarded
the Gold Medal and Ribbon of the Czechoslovak Society for Foreign Relations for
her services to Czech literature. She passed away in 1995, at the age of 82, at
home in her beloved Shropshire.