‘This fellow certainly could,’ allowed Hugh, grinning. ‘Though sidewise even I could make two of him as he is now. But you’ll see for yourself, and no doubt be casting an eye over all your acquaintance to find a man whose cast-offs would fit him. As for what use I have for him, apart from keeping him from starving to death—my sergeant is already putting it about that our wild man is taken, and I’ve no doubt he won’t omit the matter of the dagger. No need to frighten the poor devil worse than he’s been frightened already by charging him, but if the world outside has it on good authority that our murderer is safe behind bars, so much the better. Everyone can breathe more freely—notably the murderer. And a man off his guard, as you said, may make a fatal slip.’
Cadfael considered and approved. So desirable an ending, to have an outlaw and a stranger, who mattered to nobody, blamed for whatever evil was done locally; and one week now to pass before the wedding party assembled, all with minds at ease.
‘For that stubborn lad of yours at Saint Giles,’ said Hugh very seriously, ‘knows what happened to Peter Clemence, whether he had any hand in it, or no.’
‘Knows,’ said Brother Cadfael, equally gravely, ‘or thinks he knows.’
He went up through the town to the castle that same afternoon, bespoken by Hugh from the abbot as healer even to prisoners and criminals. He found the prisoner Harald in a cell at least dry, with a stone bench to lie on, and blankets to soften it and wrap him from the cold, and that was surely Hugh’s doing. The opening of the door upon his solitude occasioned instant mute alarm, but the appearance of a Benedictine habit both astonished and soothed him, and to be asked to show his hurts was still deeper bewilderment, but softened into wonder and hope. After long loneliness, where the sound of a voice could mean nothing but threat, the fugitive recovered his tongue rustily but gratefully, and ended in a flood of words like floods of tears, draining and exhausting him. After Cadfael left him he stretched and eased into prodigious sleep.
Cadfael reported to Hugh before leaving the castle wards.
‘He’s a farrier, he says a good one. It may well be true, it is the only source of pride he has left. Can you use such? I’ve dressed his bite with a lotion of hound’s-tongue, and anointed a few other cuts and grazes he has. I think he’ll do well enough. Let him eat little but often for a day or two or he’ll sicken. He’s from some way south, by Gretton. He says his lord’s steward took his sister against her will, and he tried to avenge her. He was not good at murder,’ said Cadfael wryly, ‘and the ravisher got away with a mere graze. He may be better at farriery. His lord sought his blood and he ran—who could blame him?’
‘Villein?’ asked Hugh resignedly.
‘Surely.’
‘And sought, probably vindictively. Well, they’ll have a vain hunt if they hunt him into Shrewsbury castle, we can hold him securely enough. And you think he tells truth?’
‘He’s too far gone to lie,” said Cadfael. ‘Even if lying came easily, and I think this is a simple soul who leans to truth. Besides, he believes in my habit. We have still a reputation, Hugh, God send we may deserve it.’
‘He’s within a charter town, if he is in prison,’ said Hugh with satisfaction, ‘and it would be a bold lord who would try to take him from the king’s hold. Let his master rejoice in thinking the poor wretch held for murder, if that gives him pleasure. We’ll put it about, then, that our murderer’s taken, and watch for what follows.’
The news went round, as news does, from gossip to gossip, those within the town parading their superior knowledge to those without, those who came to market in town or Foregate carrying their news to outer villages and manors. As the word of Peter Clemence’s disappearance had been blown on the wind, and after it news of the discovery of his body in the forest, so did every breeze spread abroad the word that his killer was already taken and in prison in the castle, found in possession of the dead man’s dagger, and charged with his murder. No more mystery to be mulled over in taverns and on street-corners, no further sensations to be hoped for. The town made do with what it had, and made the most of it. More distant and isolated manors had to wait a week or more for the news to reach them.
The marvel was that it took three whole days to reach Saint Giles. Isolated though the hospice was, since its inmates were not allowed nearer the town for fear of contagion, somehow they usually seemed to get word of everything that was happening almost as soon as it was common gossip in the streets; but this time the system was slow in functioning. Brother Cadfael had given anxious thought to consideration of what effect the news was likely to have upon Meriet. But there was nothing to be done about that but to wait and see. No need to make a point of bringing the story to the young man’s ears deliberately, better let it make its way to him by the common talk, as to everyone else.
So it was not until two lay servants came to deliver the hospital’s customary loaves from the abbey bakery, on the third day, that word of the arrest of the runaway villein Harald came to Meriet’s ears. By chance it was he who took in the great basket and unloaded the bread in the store, helped by the two bakery hands who had brought it. For his silence they made up in volubility.
‘You’ll be getting more and more beggars coming in for shelter, brother, if this cold weather sets in in earnest. Hard frost and an east wind again, no season to be on the roads.’
Civil but taciturn, Meriet agreed that winter came hard on the poor.
‘Not that they’re all honest and deserving,’ said the other, shrugging. ‘Who knows what you’re taking in sometimes? Rogues and vagabonds as likely as not, and who’s to tell the difference?’
‘There’s one you might have got this week past that you can well do without,’ said his fellow, ‘for you might have got a throat cut in the night, and whatever’s worth stealing made away with. But you’re safe from him, at any rate, for he’s locked up in Shrewsbury castle till he comes to his trial for murder.’
‘For killing a priest, at that! He’ll pay for it with his own neck, surely, but that’s poor reparation for a priest.’
Meriet had turned, stiffly attentive, staring at them with frowning eyes. ‘For killing a priest? What priest? Who is this you speak of?’
‘What, have you not heard yet? Why, the bishop of Winchester’s chaplain that was found in the Long Forest. A wild man who’s been preying on the houses outside the town killed him. It’s what I was saying, with winter coming on sharp now you might have had him shivering and begging at your door here, and with the priest’s own dagger under his ragged coat ready for you.’
‘Let me understand you,’ said Meriet slowly. ‘You say a man is taken for that death? Arrested and charged with it?’
‘Taken, charged, gaoled, and as good as hanged,’ agreed his informant cheerfully. ‘That’s one you need not worry your head about, brother.’
‘What man is he? How did this come about?’ asked Meriet urgently.
They told him, in strophe and antistrophe, pleased to find someone who had not already heard the tale.
‘And waste of time to deny, for he had the dagger on him that belonged to the murdered man. Found it, he said, in the charcoal hearth there, and a likely tale that makes.’
Staring beyond them, Meriet asked, low-voiced: ‘What like is he, this fellow? A local man? Do you know his name?’
That they could not supply, but they could describe him. ‘Not from these parts, some runaway living rough, a poor starving wretch, swears he’s never done worse than steal a little bread or an egg to keep himself alive, but the foresters say he’s taken their deer in his time. Thin as a fence-pale, and in rags, a desperate case…”
They took their basket and departed, and Meriet went about his work in dead, cold silence all that day. A desperate case—yes, so it sounded. As good as hanged! Starved and runaway and living wild, thin to emaciation…
He said no word to Brother Mark, but one of the brightest and most inquisitive of the children had stretched his ears in the kitchen doorway and heard the exchanges, and spread the news through the household with natural relish. Life in Saint Giles, however sheltered, could be tedious, it was none the worse for an occasional sensation to vary the routine of the day. The story came to Brother Mark’s ears. He debated whether to speak or not, watching the chill mask of Meriet’s face, and the inward stare of his hazel eyes. But at last he did venture a word.