Justice for the Damned (15 page)

Not
an unreasonable proposal, Eleanor decided. Fatigue began to fill her body with
heaviness. If she stayed longer, would she have the strength to walk back to
the priory? She willed the tiredness away.

"My
father had a competent man who could have run the business for him, and the man
is still there. He can handle everything for us now. There is no need for me to
marry Master Herbert."

"That
man is leaving to take on his own apprentices, although he promised that he
would find another experienced in wool who can work under Master Herbert's
direction. The business is well established but needs the firm hand of a clever
merchant, not a mere boy!" Jhone looked at the prioress, her eyes pleading
for understanding. "I beg of you, my lady, speak reason to this willful
child for it seems she must hear it from someone other than me."

Eleanor
nodded.

"Sadly,
my mother wishes only to hear her husband's voice," Alys said with more
tenderness than her words would suggest.

"How
dare you speak as if he were not your sire?"

Alys
shrugged. "My father thought only of earthly profits. He would never have
seen more gain in a heavenly marriage than in an earthly one, but I shall not
make the same mistake—if I am forced to choose only between a vintner and
God."

Although
Alys' argument reminded Eleanor somewhat of her own when faced with a similar
choice some years ago, the prioress knew this girl would prefer a secular life
as long as she could marry Master Glover.

"Your
father was a true Christian! How dare you suggest otherwise?"

Alys
threw her hands up in disgust.

Jhone
twisted a handful of her robe. "You should be grateful that he chose
Master Herbert, a most kind and charitable man, for you to wed. How many would
be willing to marry into a family whose reputation has been soiled as ours has
been by your uncle's past and your cousin's present sins?"

"Bernard
does not care about old or unfounded rumors! Why will you not see this same
quality in him?"

"Your
glover is an impractical youth, someone who would rather ride out to that pile
of pagan rocks and imagine things that never happened. Master Herbert is a
sensible man, one who knows the importance of profit and will provide well for
you and your children."

"Bernard
has virtues!"

"You
see," Jhone said with a conspiratorial glance at the prioress, "she
cannot deny that her boy is a dreamer."

Eleanor's
head was starting to spin.

"His
gloves are finely made, and he has a craftsman's eye! Have you not seen the
beautiful objects he has given his mother?"

"Pretty
baubles, things she cannot use like we do our pewter and plate. He should be
investing in items of worth, not buying useless trifles."

Mistress
Jhone might have won that argument, Eleanor thought.

"He
is moderate in his ways, has never raised a hand in anger, and..."

"..
.is easily led by others, especially women."

"He
listens to my ideas and believes I would be a valuable partner in his trade.
Where is the sin in that, if we prosper? As to the rest, dare you say I speak
falsely?"

The
mother snorted her contempt.

To
my mind, at least, Alys won that point, Eleanor decided.

The
church bells began to ring the hour.

Eleanor
brightened. Now she had reason to leave before she fainted with weariness.
Slowly she rose. "I fear it is close to None, and I must return to the
priory."

"My
lady, will you return and give my daughter the benefit of your wise advice?
Surely you can see that she has no calling to become a nun?"

Delighted
at the invitation, Eleanor nodded. If God grants me wisdom, she thought, I
might bring the balm of peace to this mother and daughter. If He is willing, I
may also find out what sins Wulfstan committed long ago and why a vintner's
dead wife would wish to kill the father instead of the son, a man who may have
helped send her soul to Hell.

"We
will speak together soon," Eleanor said, looking at Alys with a reassuring
smile. "Sister Beatrice would wish it."

Or
will after I tell her what I have heard, the prioress said to herself, then
left to collect her obedient escorts from the kitchen.

Chapter
Seventeen

Eleanor
walked slowly back to the priory. At this sluggish pace, she would miss the
Office, but surely God would understand and accept her humble, silent
repetition of prayers. Had she not been kept in the village by the need to
restore peace to His house?

The
meeting with Jhone and Alys had brought many interesting things to light about
both ghost and murder, troublesome questions that hung like broken threads from
a tapestry. They must fit somewhere, but she could not see how they should be
placed to make the pattern clear. Perhaps Brother Thomas had some enlightening
news and was waiting for her to return.

As
the image of the monk occupied her mind, she was surprised that her thoughts of
him were unaccompanied this time by the usual pang of guilt. The cooling of her
flesh, temporary though that might be, had most certainly been a welcome
respite from her relentless and gnawing hunger to bed the man. By pushing back
the fiend who tormented her so, God had brought a gentle shower of hope to her
scorched soul.

Wasn't
there a treatise that dealt with love between monastics and spiritual
friendship? Her aunt had mentioned it years ago when Eleanor was ready to take
final vows, but she had never read it. Now she remembered: it was written by
Aelred of Rievaulx. Might his words help her cope when the Prince of Darkness
sent his imps once again to set fire to her loins? Although the great
Cistercian abbot would not have discussed the possibility of such a thing
between men and women, Eleanor wondered if his principles could apply in an
Order where the two sexes must interact in holy purpose.

Her
step lightened. When she finally had time alone with her aunt to seek advice on
her sinful longings, Eleanor would ask her opinion on whether the abbot's
treatise had insights to help both a prioress and a frail woman.

Meanwhile,
what sin could there be in appreciating a man who had proven his worth as an
instrument of God's justice? Without question she liked his courtly wit, but
she also respected his gentleness as he consoled those in Tyndal's hospital, in
particular the suffering children. She doubted he had come to the priory with a
strong vocation, but she found him diligent in his duties and wise as a
confessor to her nuns.

All
told, he had proven himself to be a good man, and she had grieved when his
black humors recaptured his spirit on his father's death. Even Sister Anne had
failed to comfort him as he fell into a silence darkened with sorrow. She
prayed he broke it with his confessor.

At
least he had cheered when her aunt had given him the task of discovering what
lay behind this ghost, she thought, then frowned. Was it the chance to serve
God that refreshed his soul, or had he simply enjoyed escaping from walls he
never wanted to surround him in the first place? The thought troubled her. How
strongly did the world pull at her monk?

Eleanor
glanced back at her two attendants. Although they had remained meekly quiet
during this trip into the village, she noted the eagerness with which they now
looked around, as if storing rare glimpses of the secular world to savor once
they were back within priory confines. Were either truly suited to the
contemplative life, she wondered, or were all mortals so joined to the dust
from which they came that no one could truly leave the world? Maybe Brother
Thomas was no different from any other.

Neither,
perhaps, was she. She stopped to take delight in the sight of her beloved Avon. On the path along the river, she noticed a plump young merchant in close conversation
with one of his men. The laborer gestured toward the priory walls. The merchant
laughed, a sound that seemed both hearty and full of joy to Eleanor's ears. As
she smiled at their merriment, she decided that Man might be weak to find
pleasure in the earth, but surely God found little sin in this appreciation of
His wondrous creation.

She
nodded in sympathy at her two attendants, now pink-faced with embarrassment
from their not-so-secret thoughts, and resumed her walk to the priory gate.
There were less innocent enjoyments here than the sight of a river, however.
Had it been too cruel to send Brother Thomas to the inn, a place full of
worldly temptations? She had good reason to be confident that he was true to
his vows, but she knew from her own experience how quickly flesh joined Satan's
games. If she, a woman who had no doubt about her vocation, had suffered lust,
how much harder would it be for one who had less of a calling? She closed her
eyes and prayed the monk had sinned little beyond taking more drink than might
be wise.

The
issue of religious vows turned Eleanor's mind back to the contentious debate
within the woolmonger's family. Alys had no true calling to become a nun in any
Order. That was quite clear. She was most suited to becoming a wife, and her
mother had good reason for choosing a successful merchant as the girl's
husband.

Although
Eleanor had never met the glover, she had not found Master Herbert either
ill-favored or insensitive. The match between the pair might not start out with
mutual love, but that could grow if each treated the other with thoughtful
respect. The marriage between her own father and mother had been arranged as a
union of property, not hearts, yet Baron Adam still grieved over his wife's
death some sixteen years later. Despite her sympathy for Alys, Eleanor knew it
would be best if she found some way of getting the girl to make peace with her
parents' choice of spouse.

That
aside, what had she learned about this ghost? According to Jhone, there was a
connection between Wulfstan's death and the vintner's dead wife, but Eleanor
could see no logic in the supposition. Even assuming the soul of Eda was
seeking vengeance for her place in the Devil's kingdom, why kill the father and
not the son who led her there? And who, besides the vintner himself, would have
reason to seek revenge?

She
shook her head. That last thought was ridiculous. Why would Master Herbert kill
the adulterer's father but pursue marriage with the cousin of the seducer? And
why would any killer pointedly bring attention to a tie between his adulterous
wife's death and Wulfstan's murder, a link that could well point back at him?

Stopping
at the gate, Eleanor closed her eyes and forced her tired mind to see reason in
any of this. Nay, the laborer must have been killed by someone who had a
quarrel with him, not with Sayer.

"My
lady!" The porter's tremulous voice broke through her jumbled thoughts.
Although bowing out of respect for her rank, his expression resembled that of a
loving father.

She
greeted him with affection.

"Brother
Thomas has begged an audience when you return."

"Please
send him to Prioress Ida's lodging," she replied.

As
she started to walk in that direction herself, she stopped, her mouth open in
wondrous amazement. Had she not returned from the house of Mistress Jhone
filled with deep weariness? Yet now her body had lost that exhaustion. God was
most kind!

Brother
Thomas accepted a mazer of wine and watered it well. "I fear I bring
little news."

"May
I ask if you slept well, Brother?" Anne teased.

The
monk's face flushed. "I did oversleep all the Offices until now. For that,
I will do penance.

"And
drank more than you are accustomed to do?" The prioress' voice suggested
no reproach.

He
nodded. "Far more than any man ought, my lady. Brother Porter must have
long been in his bed when I returned. I slept in the grass, quite near the
priory walls. Today, I swear Satan has taken over Hell's smithy and is pounding
an anvil in my head."

"That
is penance enough," Eleanor replied. "You were toiling at God's work,
and if that is the worst of your sinning..." His admission of drunkenness
was frank enough. Surely he had committed no greater error than this one touch
on Satan's hand. She exhaled with relief and quickly nodded for him to
continue.

"There
are no recent strangers in Amesbury, except ourselves, according to a young
merchant I met at the inn. He knew of no one who might have a grudge against
this priory." He hesitated.

The
pause was not lost on the prioress. "No one?"

"The
merchant said he was the only one who might, then swore he was jesting."

"Did
he explain what he meant?"

"He
is unmarried and grieved that the priory was able to win so many pretty girls
to God's service when he could not gain the hand of any. Perhaps he feared he
would be forced to marry some elderly widow."

"You
spoke only to this merchant?" Anne offered more wine to Thomas.

He
refused with an amiable wince. "He had much to say, including that many in
the village believe demons have lurked for years near the mammoth stones that
lie not far from here." He hesitated, as if waiting for his prioress to
ask a question.