Dead Man's Ransom (14 page)

The dishes had been removed, and the mead and wine were circulating freely, when Tudur’s steward came into the hall and made for the high table.

“My lord, there’s one here asks leave to present to you his natural son, whom he has acknowledged and admitted to his kinship only two days ago. Griffri ap Llywarch, from close by Meifod. Will you hear him?”

“Willingly,” said Owain, pricking up his fair head to stare down through the smoke and shadows of the hall with some curiosity. “Let Griffri ap Llywarch come in and be welcome.” Cadfael had not paid due attention to the name, and might not even have recognised it if he had, nor was he likely to recognise a man he had never seen before. The newcomer followed the steward into the hall, and up between the tables to the high place. A lean, sinewy man, perhaps fifty years old, balding and bearded, with a hillman’s gait, and the weathered face and wrinkled, far-seeing eyes of the shepherd. His clothing was plain and brown, but good homespun. He came straight to the dais, and made the Welshman’s brisk, unservile reverence to the prince.

“My lord Owain, I have brought you my son, that you may know and approve him. For the only son I had by my wife is two years and more dead, and I was without children, until this my son by another woman came to me declaring his birth and proving it. And I have acknowledged him mine and brought him into my kinship, and as mine he is accepted. Now I ask your countenance also.” He stood proudly, glad of what he had to say and of the young man he had to present; and Cadfael would have had neither eyes nor ears for any other man present, if it had not been for the courteous silence that had followed him up the hall, and the one clear sound that carried in it. Shadows and smoke veiled the figure that followed respectfully at some yards distance, but the sound of its steps was plainly audible, and went haltingly, lighter and faster upon one foot. Cadfael’s eyes were upon the son when he came hesitantly into the torchlight from the high table. This one he knew, though the black hair was trimmed and thrown proudly back from a face not now sullen and closed, but open, hopeful and eager, and there was no longer a crutch under the leaning armpit.

Cadfael looked back from Anion ap Griffri to Griffri ap Llywarch, to whose drear and childless middle age this unlooked-for son had suddenly supplied a warm heart of hope and content. The homespun cloak hanging loose upon Griffri’s shoulders bore in its folds a long pin with a large, chased gold head secured with a thin gold chain. And that, too, Cadfael had seen before, and knew only too well.

So did another witness. Einon ab Ithel had come in, as one familiar with the household and desirous of making no inconvenient stir, by the high door from the private chamber, and emerged behind the prince’s table unnoticed. The man who was holding all attention naturally drew his. The red of torchlight flashed from the ornament worn openly and proudly. Its owner had the best reason to know there could not be two such, not of that exact and massive size and ornamentation.

“God’s breath!” swore Einon ab Ithel in a great bellow of astonishment and indignation. “What manner of thief have we here, wearing my gold under my very eyes?”

Silence fell as ominously as thunder, and every head whirled from prince and petitioner to stare at this loud accuser. Einon came round the high table in a few long strides, dropped from the dais so close as to send Griffri lurching back in alarm, and stabbed a hard brown finger at the pin that glowed in the drab cloak.

“My lord, this—is mine! Gold out of my earth, I had it mined, I had it made for me, there is not another exactly like it in this or any land. When I came back from Shrewsbury, on that errand you know of, it was not in my collar, nor have I seen it since that day. I thought it fallen somewhere on the road, and made no ado about it. What is it to mourn for, gold! Now I see it again and marvel. My lord, it is in your hands. Demand of this man how he comes to be wearing what is mine.” Half the hall was on its feet, and rumbling with menace, for theft, unmitigated by circumstances, was the worst crime they acknowledged, and the thief caught red, handed could be killed on sight by the wronged man. Griffri stood stricken dumb, staring in bewilderment. Anion flung himself with stretched arms and braced body between his father and Einon.

“My lord, my lord, I gave it, I brought it to my father. I did not steal… I took a price! Hold my father blameless, if there is blame it is mine only…” He was sweating with terror, great sudden gouts that ran on his forehead and were snared in his thick brows. And if he knew a little Welsh, in this extremity it did not serve him, he had cried out in English. That gave them all a moment of surprise. And Owain swept a hand over the hall and brought silence.

“Sit, and keep closed mouths. This is my matter. I’ll have quiet and all here shall have justice.” They murmured, but they obeyed. In the ensuing hush Brother Cadfael rose unobtrusively to his feet and made his way round the table and down to the floor of the hall. His movements, however discreet, drew the prince’s eye.

“My lord,” said Cadfael deprecatingly, “I am of Shrewsbury, I know and am known to this man Anion ap Griffri. He was raised English, no fault of his. Should he need one to interpret, I can do that service, so that he may be understood by all here.”

“A fair offer,” said Owain, and eyed him thoughtfully. “Are you also empowered, brother, to speak for Shrewsbury, since it seems this accusation goes back to that town, and the business of which we know? And if so, for shire and town or for abbey?”

“Here and now,” said Cadfael boldly, “I will venture for both. And if any find fault hereafter, let it fall on me.”

“You are here, I fancy,” said Owain, considering, “over this very matter.”

“I am. In part to look for this same jewel. For it vanished from Gilbert Prestcote’s chamber in our infirmary on the day that he died. The cloak that had been added to the sick man’s wrappings in the litter was handed back to Einon ab Ithel without it. Only after he had left did we remember and look for the brooch. And only now do I see it again.”

“From the room where a man died by murder,” said Einon. “Brother, you have found more than the gold. You may send our men home.” Anion stood fearful but steadfast between his father and the accusing stare of a hall full of eyes. He was white as ice, translucent, as though all the blood had left his veins. “I did not kill,” he said hoarsely, and heaved hard to get breath enough to speak. “My lord, I never knew… I thought the pin was his, Prestcote’s. I took it from the cloak, yes,—”

“After you had killed him,” said Einon harshly.

“No! I swear it! I never touched the man.” He turned in desperate appeal to Owain, who sat listening dispassionately at the table, his fingers easy round the stem of his wine, cup, but his eyes very bright and aware. “My lord, only hear me! And hold my father clear of all, for all he knows is what I have told him, and the same I shall tell you, and as God sees me, I do not lie.”

“Hand up to me,” said Owain, “that pin you wear.” And as Griffri hurried with trembling fingers to detach it, and reached up to lay it in the prince’s hand: “So! I have known this too long and seen it worn too often to be in any doubt whose it is. From you, brother, as from Einon here, I know how it came to be flung open to hand by the sheriffs bed. Now you may tell, Anion, how you came by it. English I can follow, you need not fear being misunderstood. And Brother Cadfael will put what you say into Welsh, so that all here may understand you.”

Anion gulped air and found a creaky voice that gathered body and passion as he used it. Shock and terror had contracted his throat, but the flow of words washed constraint away. “My lord, until these last days I never saw my father, nor he me, but I had a brother, as he has said, and by chance I got to know him when he came into Shrewsbury with wool to sell. There was a year between us, and I am the elder. He was my kin, and I valued him. And once when he visited the town and I was not by, there was a fight, a man was killed and my brother was blamed for it. Gilbert Prestcote hanged him!” Owain glanced aside at Cadfael, and waited until this speech had been translated for the Welshmen. Then he asked: “You know of this case? Was it fairly done?”

“Who knows which hand did the killing?” said Cadfael. “It was a street brawl, the young men were drunk. Gilbert Prestcote was hasty by nature, but just. But this is certain, here in Wales the young man would not have hanged. A blood-price would have paid it.”

“Go on,” said Owain.

“I carried that grudge on my heart from that day,” said Anion, gathering passion from old bitterness. “But when did I ever come within reach of the sheriff? Never until your men brought him into Shrewsbury wounded and housed him in the infirmary. And I was there with this broken leg of mine all but healed, and that man only twenty paces from me, only a wall between us, my enemy at my mercy. While it was all still and the brothers at dinner, I went into the room where he was. He owed my house a life—even if I was mongrel, I felt Welsh then, and I meant to take my due revenge—I meant to kill! The only brother ever I had, and he was merry and good to look upon, and then to hang for an unlucky blow when he was full of ale! I went in there to kill. But I could not do it! When I saw my enemy brought down so low, so old and weary, hardly blood or breath in him… I stood by him and watched, and all I could feel was sadness. It seemed to me that there was no call there for vengeance, for all was already avenged. So I thought on another way. There was no court to set a blood-price or enforce payment, but there was the gold pin in the cloak beside him. I thought it was his. How could I know? So I took it as galanas, to clear the debt and the grudge. But by the end of that day I knew, we all knew, that Prestcote was dead and dead by murder, and when they began to question even me, I knew that if ever it came out what I had done it would be said I had also killed him. So I ran. I meant, in any case, to come and seek my father some day, and tell him my brother’s death was paid for, but because I was afraid I had to run in haste.”

“And come to me he did,” said Griffri earnestly, his hand upon his son’s shoulder, “and showed me by way of warranty the yellow mountain stone I gave his mother long ago. But by his face I knew him, for he’s like the brother he lost. And he gave me that thing you hold, my lord, and told me that young Griffri’s death was requited, and this was the token price exacted, and the grudge buried, for our enemy was dead. I did not well understand him then, for I told him if he had slain Griffri’s slayer, then he had no right to take a price as well. But he swore to me by most solemn oath that it was not he who had killed and I believe him. And judge if I am glad to have a son restored me in my middle years, to be the prop of my old age. For God’s sake, my lord, do not take him from me now!” In the dour, considering hush that followed Cadfael completed his translation of what Anion had said, and took his time about it to allow him to study the prince’s impassive face. At the end of it the silence continued still for a long minute, since no one would speak until Owain made it possible. He, too, was in no hurry. He looked at father and son, pressed together there below the dais in apprehensive solidarity, he looked at Einon, whose face was as unrevealing as his own, and last at Cadfael.

“Brother, you know more of what has gone forward in Shrewsbury abbey than any of us here. You know this man. How do you say? Do you believe his story?”

“Yes,” said Cadfael, with grave and heartfelt gratitude, “I do believe it. It fits with all I know. But I would ask Anion one question.”

“Ask it.”

“You stood beside the bed, Anion, and watched the sleeper. Are you sure that he was then alive?”

“Yes, surely,” said Anion wondering. “He breathed, he moaned in his sleep. I saw and heard. I know.”

“My lord,” said Cadfael, watching Owain’s enquiring eye, “there was another heard to enter and leave that room, some little while later, someone who went not haltingly, as Anion did, but lightly. That one did not take anything, unless it was a life. Moreover, I believe what Anion has told us because there is yet another thing I have to find before I shall have found Gilbert Prestcote’s murderer.” Owain nodded comprehension, and mused for a while in silence. Then he picked up the gold pin with a brisk movement, and held it out to Einon. “How say you? Was this theft?”

“I am content,” said Einon and laughed, releasing the tension in the hall. In the general stir and murmur of returning ease, the prince turned to his host.

“Make a place below there, Tudur, for Griffri ap Llywarch, and his son Anion.”

Chapter Eleven

SO THERE WENT SHREWSBURY’S PRIME SUSPECT, the man gossip had already hanged and buried, down the hall on his father’s heels, stumbling a little and dazed like a man in a dream, but beginning to shine as though a torch had been kindled within him; down to a place with his father at one of the tables, equal among equals. From a serving-maid’s by-blow, without property or privilege, he was suddenly become a free man, with a rightful place of his own in a kindred, heir to a respected sire, accepted by his prince. The threat that had forced him to take to his heels had turned into the greatest blessing of his life and brought him to the one place that was his by right in Welsh law, true son to a father who acknowledged him proudly. Here Anion was no bastard.

Cadfael watched the pair of them to their places, and was glad that something good, at least, should have come out of the evil. Where would that young man have found the courage to seek out his father, distant, unknown, speaking another language, if fear had not forced his hand, and made it easy to leap across a frontier? The ending was well worth the terror that had gone before. He could forget Anion now. Anion’s hands were clean.

“At least you’ve sent me one man,” observed Owain, watching thoughtfully as the pair reached their places, “in return for my eight still in bond. Not a bad figure of a man, either. But no training in arms, I doubt.”

“An excellent cattle-man,” said Cadfael. “He has an understanding with all animals. You may safely put your horses in his care.”

“And you lose, I gather, your chief contender for a halter. You have no after-thoughts concerning him?”

“None. I am sure he did as he says he did. He dreamed of avenging himself on a strong and overbearing man, and found a broken wreck he could not choose but pity.”

“No bad ending,” said Owain. “And now I think we might withdraw to some quieter place, and you shall tell us whatever you have to tell, and ask whatever you need to ask.”

In the prince’s chamber they sat about the small, wire-guarded brazier, Owain, Tudur, Einan ab Ithel and Cadfael. Cadfael had brought with him the little box in which he had preserved the wisps of wool and gold thread. Those precise shades of deep blue and soft rose could not be carried accurately in the mind, but must continually be referred to the eye, and matched against whatever fabric came to light. He had the box in the scrip at his girdle, and was wary of opening it where there might be even the faintest draught, for fear the frail things within would be blown clean away. A breath from a loophole could whisk his ominous treasures out of reach in an instant.

He had debated within himself how much he should tell, but in the light of Cristina’s revelation, and since her father was here in conference, he told all he knew, how Elis in his captivity had fallen haplessly in love with Prestcote’s daughter, and how the pair of them had seen no possible hope of gaining the sheriffs approval for such a match, hence providing reason enough why Elis should attempt to disturb the invalid’s rest—whether to remove by murder the obstacle to his love, as Melicent accused, or to plead his forlorn cause, as Elis himself protested.

“So that was the way of it,” said Owain, and exchanged a straight, hard look with Tudur, unsurprised, and forbearing from either sympathy or blame. Tudur was on close terms of personal friendship with his prince, and had surely spoken with him of Cristina’s confidences. Here was the other side of the coin. “And this was after Einon had left you?”

“It was. It came out that the boy had tried to speak with Gilbert, and been ordered out by Brother Edmund. When the girl heard of it, she turned on him for a murderer.”

“But you do not altogether accept that. Nor, it seems, has Beringar accepted it.”

“There is no more proof of it than that he was there, beside the bed, when Edmund came and drove him out. It could as well have been for the boy’s declared purpose as for anything worse. And then, you’ll understand, there was the matter of the gold pin. We never realised it was missing, my lord, until you had ridden for home. But very certainly Elis neither had it on him, nor had had any opportunity to hide it elsewhere before he was searched. Therefore someone else had been in that room and taken it away.”

“But now that we know what befell my pin,” said Einon, “and are satisfied Anion did not murder, does not that leave that boy again in danger of being branded for the killing of a sick and sleeping man? Though it sorts very poorly,” he added, “with what I know of him.”

“Which of us,” said Owain sombrely, “has never been guilty of some unworthiness that sorts very ill with what our friends know of us? Even with what we know, or think we know, of ourselves! I would not rule out any man from being capable once in his life of a gross infamy.” He looked up at Cadfael. “Brother, I recall you said, within there, that there was yet one more thing you must find, belore you would have found Prestcote’s murderer. What is that thing?”

“It is the cloth that was used to smother Gilbert. By its traces it will be known, once found. For it was pressed down over his nose and mouth, and he breathed it into his nostrils and drew it into his teeth, and a thread or two of it we found in his beard. No ordinary cloth. Elis had neither that nor anything else in his hands when he came from the infirmary. Once I had found and preserved the filaments from it, we searched for it throughout the abbey precincts, for it could have been a hanging or an altar-cloth, but we have found nothing to match these fragments. Until we know what it was, and what became of it, we shall not know who killed Gilbert Prestcote.”

“This is certain?” asked Owain. “You drew these threads from the dead man’s nostrils and mouth? You think you will know, when you find it, the very cloth that was used to stifle him?”

“I do think so, for the colours are clear, and not common dyes. I have the box here. But open it with care. What’s within is fine as cobweb.” Cadfael handed the little box across the brazier. “But not here. The up-draught from the warmth could blow them away.” Owain took the box aside, and held it low under one of the lamps, where the light would play into it. The minute threads quivered faintly, and again were still. “Here’s gold thread, that’s plain, a twisted strand. The rest—I see it’s wool, by the many hairs and the live texture. A darker colour and a lighter.” He studied them narrowly, but shook his head. “I could not say what tints are here, only that the cloth had a good gold thread woven into it. And I fancy it would be thick, a heavy weave, by the way the wool curls and crimps. Many more such fine hairs went to make up this yarn.”

“Let me see,” said Einon, and narrowed his eyes over the box. “I see the gold, but the colours… No, it means nothing to me.” Tudur peered, and shook his head. “We have not the light for this, my lord. By day these would show very differently.” It was true, by the mellow light of these oil, lamps the prince’s hair was deep harvest, gold, almost brown. By daylight it was the yellow of primroses. “It might be better,” agreed Cadfael, “to leave the matter until morning. Even had we better vision, what could be done at this hour?”

“This light foils the eye,” said Owain. He closed the lid over the airy fragments. “Why did you think you might find what you seek here?”

“Because we have not found it within the pale of the abbey, so we must look outside, wherever men have dispersed from the abbey. The lord Einon and two captains beside had left us before ever we recovered these threads, it was a possibility, however frail, that unknowingly this cloth had gone with them. By daylight the colours will show for what they truly are. You may yet recall seeing such a weave.” Cadfael took back the box. It had been a fragile hope at best, but the morrow remained. There was a man’s life, a man’s soul’s health, snared in those few quivering hairs, and he was their custodian.

“Tomorrow,” said the prince emphatically, “we will try what God’s light can show us, since ours is too feeble.”

In the deep small hours of that same night Elis awoke in the dark cell in the outer ward of Shrewsbury castle, and lay with stretched ears, struggling up from the dullness of sleep and wondering what had shaken him out of so profound a slumber. He had grown used to all the daytime sounds native to this place, and to the normal unbroken silence of the night. This night was different, or he would not have been heaved so rudely out of the only refuge he had from his daytime miseries. Something was not as it should have been, someone was astir at a time when there was always silence and stillness. The air quivered with soft movements and distant voices.

They were not locked in, their word had been accepted without question, bond enough to hold them. Elis raised himself cautiously on an elbow, and leaned to listen to Eliud’s breathing in the bed beside him. Deep asleep, if not altogether at peace. He twitched and turned without awaking, and the measure of his breathing changed uneasily, shortening and shallowing sometimes, then easing into a long rhythm that promised better rest. Elis did not want to disturb him. It was all due to him, to his pig, headed folly in joining Cadwaladr, that Eliud was here a prisoner beside him. He must not be drawn still deeper into question and danger, whatever happened to Elis.

There were certainly voices, at some small distance but muffled and made to sound infinitely more distant by the thick stone walls. And though at this remove there could not possibly be distinguishable words, yet there was an indefinable agitation about the exchanges, a quiver of panic on the air. Elis slid carefully from the bed, halted and held his breath a moment to make sure that Eliud had not stirred, and felt for his coat, thankful that he slept in shirt and hose, and need not fumble in the dark to dress. With all the grief and anxiety he carried about with him night and day, he must discover the reason of this added and unforeseen alarm. Every divergence from custom was a threat.

The door was heavy but well hung, and swung without a sound. Outside the night was moonless but clear, very faint starlight patterned the sky between the walls and towers that made a shell of total darkness. He drew the door closed after him, and eased the heavy latch into its socket gingerly. Now the murmur of voices had body and direction, it came from the guard-room within the gatehouse. And that crisp, brief clatter that struck a hidden spark on the ground was hooves on the cobbles. A rider at this hour?

He felt his way along the wall towards the sound, at every angle flattening himself against the stones to listen afresh. The horse shifted and blew. Shapes grew gradually out of the solid darkness, the twin turrets of the barbican showed their teeth against a faintly lighter sky, and the flat surface of the closed gate beneath had a tall, narrow slit of pallor carved through it, tall as a man on horseback, and wide enough for a horse to pass in haste. The rider’s wicket was open. Open because someone had entered by it with urgent news only minutes since, and no one had yet thought to close it.

Elis crept nearer. The door of the guard-room was ajar, a long sliver of light from torches within quivered across the dark cobbles. The voices emerged by fits and starts, as they were raised and again lowered, but he caught words clearly here and there.

“… burned a farm west of Pontesbury,” reported a messenger, still breathless from his haste, “and never withdrew… They’re camped overnight… and another party skirting Minsterley to join them.” Another voice, sharp and clear, most likely one of the experienced sergeants: “What numbers?”

“In all… if they foregather… I was told it might be as many as a hundred and fifty…”

“Archers? Lancers? Foot or horse?” That was not the sergeant, that was a young voice, a shade higher than it should have been with alarm and strain. They had got Alan Herbard out of bed. This was a grave matter.

“My lord, far the greater part on foot. Lancers and archers both. They may try to encircle Pontesbury… they know Hugh Beringar is in the north…”

“Halfway to Shrewsbury!” said Herbard’s voice, taut and jealous for his first command.

“They’ll not dare that,” said the sergeant. “Plunder’s the aim. Those valley farms… with new lambs…”

“Madog ap Meredith has a grudge to settle,” ventured the messenger, still short of breath, “for that raid in February. They’re close… but the pickings are smaller, there in the forest… I doubt…”

Halfway to Shrewsbury was more than halfway to the ford in the forest where that grudge had come to birth. And the pickings… Elis turned his forehead into the chill of the stone against which he leaned and swallowed terror. A parcel of women! He was more than paid for that silly flaunt, who had a woman of his own there to sweat and bleed for, young, beautiful, fair as flax, tall like a willow. The square dark men of Powys would come to blows over her, kill one another for her, kill her when they were done.

He had started out of his shelter under the wall before he even knew what he intended. The patient, drooping horse might have given him away, but there was no groom holding it, and it stood its ground silently, unstartled, as he stole past, a hand raised to caress and beseech acceptance. He did not dare take it, the first clatter of hooves would have brought them out like hornets disturbed, but at least it let him pass unbetrayed. The big body steamed gently, he felt its heat. The tired head turned and nuzzled his hand. He drew his fingers away with stealthy gentleness, and slid past towards the elongated wicket that offered a way out into the night.

He was through, he had the descent to the castle Foregate on his right, and the way up into the town on his left. But he was out of the castle, he who had given his word not to pass the threshold, he who was forsworn from this moment, false to his word, outcast. Not even Eliud would speak for him when he knew.

The town gates would not open until dawn. Elis turned left, into the town, and groped his way by unknown lanes and passages to find some corner where he could hide until the morning. He was none too sure of his best way out, and did not stop to wonder if he would ever manage to pass unnoticed. All he knew was that he had to get to Godric’s Ford before his countrymen reached it. He got his bearings by instinct, blundering blindly round towards the eastward gates. In Saint Mary’s churchyard, though he did not know it for that, he shrank into the shelter of a porch from the chill of the wind. He had left his cloak behind in his dishonoured cell, he was half-naked to shame and the night, but he was free and on his way to deliver her. What was his honour, more than his life, compared with her safety?