“No doubt I have,” agreed Cadfael equably. “So have we all, even you. But to exert himself for truth and justice is Beringar’s duty, and so it is yours and mine, and I do it as best I may, and forbear from snatching at what offers first and easiest, and shutting my eyes to everything else in order to be rid of the labour, and at ease again. Well, it seems I’ve troubled you for nothing. But let Hugh Beringar know that I was here asking for him.”
He eyed the sergeant closely at that, and doubted whether even that message would be delivered. No, grave evidence that pointed the wrong way could not be left with this man, who was so sure of his rightness he might bend even circumstances and facts to match his opinions. No help for it, the vial would have to go on to Rhydycroesau and wait its time, when Brother Barnabas was restored, and back among his sheep.
“You mean well, brother,” said William generously, “but you are far out of your cloister in matters like these. Best leave them to those who have experience.”
Cadfael took his leave without further protest, mounted his mule, and rode back through the town to the foot of the hill, where the street turning off to the right led him to the westward bridge. At least nothing was lost, and Beringar was following up the lead he had given. It was time now to keep his mind on the journey before him, and put aside the affairs of Richildis and her son until he had done his best for Brother Barnabas.
The road from Shrewsbury to Oswestry was one of the main highroads of the region, and fairly well maintained. The old people, the Romans, had laid it long ago when they ruled in Britain, and the same road ran south-eastward right to the city of London, where King Stephen was now preparing to keep Christmas among his lords, and Cardinal-bishop Alberic of Ostia was busy holding his legatine council for the reform of the church, to the probable discomfiture of Abbot Heribert. But here, riding in the opposite direction, the road ran straight and wide, only a little overgrown with grass here and there, and encroached upon by the wild verges, through fat farming country and woods to the town of Oswestry, a distance of no more than eighteen miles. Cadfael took it at a brisk but steady pace, to keep the mule content. Beyond the town it was but four miles to the sheepfolds. In the distance, as he rode due west in the dimming light, the hills of Wales rose blue and noble, the great rolling ridge of Berwyn melting into a faintly misted sky.
He came to the small, bare grange in a fold of the hills before dark. A low, solid wooden hut housed the brothers, and beyond lay the much larger byres and stables, where the sheep could be brought in from ice and snow, and beyond again, climbing the gentle slopes, the long, complex greystone walls of the field enclosures, where they grazed in this relatively mild beginning of winter, and were fed roots and grain if ever stubble and grass failed them. The hardiest were still out at liberty in the hills. Brother Simon’s dog began to bark, pricking his ears to the neat hooves that hardly made a sound in the thin turf of the ride.
Cadfael lighted down at the door, and Simon came eagerly out to welcome him, a thin, wiry, dishevelled brother, some forty years old but still distrait as a child when anything went wrong with other than sheep. Sheep he knew as mothers know their babes, but Brother Barnabas’s illness had utterly undone him. He clasped Cadfael’s hands in his, and shook them and himself in his gratitude at no longer being alone with his patient.
“He has it hard, Cadfael, you hear the leaves of his heart rustling as he breathes, like a man’s feet in the woods in autumn. I cannot break it with a sweat, I’ve tried…”
“We’ll try again,” said Cadfael comfortably, and went into the dark, timber-scented hut before him. Within it was blessedly warm and dry; wood is the best of armours against weather, where there’s small fear of fire, as in this solitude there was none. A bare minimum of furnishing, yet enough; and within, in the inner room, Brother Barnabas lay in his bed neither asleep nor awake, only uneasily in between, rustling at every breath as Simon had said, his forehead hot and dry, his eyes half-open and vacant. A big, massive man, all muscle and bone, with reserves of fight in him that needed only a little guidance.
“You go look to whatever you should be doing,” said Cadfael, unbuckling his scrip and opening it on the foot of the bed, “and leave him to me.”
“Is there anything you will need?” asked Simon anxiously.
“A pan of water on the fire, out there, and a cloth, and a beaker ready, and that’s all. If I want for more, I’ll find it.”
Blessedly, he was taken at his word; Brother Simon had a childlike faith in all who practised peculiar mysteries. Cadfael worked upon Brother Barnabas without haste all the evening, by a single candle that Simon brought as the light died. A hot stone wrapped in Welsh flannel for the sick man’s feet, a long and vigorous rub for chest and throat and ribs, down to the waist, with an ointment of goose-grease impregnated with mustard and other heat-giving herbs, and chest and throat then swathed in a strip of the same flannel, cool cloths on the dry forehead, and a hot draught of wine mulled with spices and borage and other febrifuge herbs. The potion went down patiently and steadily, with eased breathing and relaxing sinews. The patient slept fitfully and uneasily; but in the middle of the night the sweat broke like a storm of rain, drenching the bed. The two attentive nurses lifted the patient, when the worst was past, drew the blanket from under him and laid a fresh one, rolled him close in another, and covered him warmly again.
“Go and sleep,” said Cadfael, content, “for he does very well. By dawn he’ll be wake and hungry.”
In that he was out by some hours, for Brother Barnabas, once fallen into a deep and troubled sleep, slept until almost noon the following day, when he awoke clear-eyed and with quiet breathing, but weak as a new lamb.
“Never trouble for that,” said Cadfael cheerfully. “Even if you were on your feet, we should hardly let you out of here for a couple of days, or longer. You have time in plenty, enjoy being idle. Two of us are enough to look after your flock for you.”
Brother Barnabas, again at ease in his body, was content to take him at his word, and luxuriate in his convalescence. He ate, at first doubtfully, for savour had left him in his fever, then, rediscovering the pleasures of taste, his appetite sharpened into fierce hunger.
“The best sign we could have,” said Cadfael. “A man who eats heartily and with enjoyment is on his way back to health.” And they left the patient to sleep again as thoroughly as he had eaten, and went out to the sheep, and the chickens and the cow, and all the rest of the denizens of the fold.
“An easy year so far,” said Brother Simon, viewing his leggy, tough hill-sheep with satisfaction. Sheep as Welsh as Brother Cadfael gazed towards the southwest, where the long ridge of Berwyn rose in the distance; long, haughty, inscrutable faces, and sharp ears, and knowing yellow eyes that could outstare a saint. “Plenty of good grazing still, what with the grass growing so late, and the good pickings they had in the stubble after harvest. And we have beet-tops, they make good fodder, too. There’ll be better fleeces than most years, when next they’re shorn, unless the winter turns cruel later on.”
From the crest of the hill above the walled folds Brother Cadfael gazed towards the south-west, where the long ridge dipped towards lower land, between the hills. “This manor of Mallilie will be somewhere in the sheltered land there, as I judge.”
“It is. Three miles round by the easy track, the manor-house drawn back between the slopes, and the lands open to the south-east. Good land for these parts. And main glad I was to know we had a steward there, when I needed a messenger. Have you an errand there, brother?”
“There’s something I must see to, when Brother Barnabas is safely on the way to health again, and I can be spared.” He turned and looked back towards the east. “Even here we must be a good mile or more the Welsh side of the old boundary dyke. I never was here before, not being a sheep man. I’m from Gwynedd myself, from the far side of Conwy. But even these hills look like home to me.”