The Way Between the Worlds Page 24

  ‘I need to know when he came to see you, and when he set out for Chatteris.’

  The bishop thought briefly, located the relevant information and said, ‘November last year. Crowland had burned; the few monks who remain there could go to the Thorney priest for confession, and there was no need for a man of Father Clement’s abilities to stay. He came to ask me to reconsider, but I had already decided to send him to Chatteris. We spoke briefly; he accepted my orders and left.’

  It accorded with what Abbot Ingulphus had said. ‘This was early in the month?’

  ‘No. It was the last week of November. I remember it because we were almost in Advent.’

  So Father Clement’s body had been in the fen for five months or more. And there it would have stayed, Hrype reflected, but for a boat captain losing his way.

  ‘Thank you, My Lord,’ Hrype said. ‘I will take my leave.’

  ‘Wait.’ The word was spoken mildly, but carried great authority. Hrype, who had already turned towards the door, stopped. ‘I wish to see the man who killed my priest brought to justice,’ the bishop said softly.

  Hrype turned back to him. ‘I do not know who that man is, nor where to find him.’

  ‘You have some ideas, though. In here.’ The bishop tapped his head. ‘You are a resourceful man.’ He paused. ‘Do you wish me to provide you with men to help you in your quest?’

  Trying not to show how much he didn’t, Hrype shook his head. ‘No. If the killer can indeed be sought out, it will be by subtlety and not by force.’

  The bishop regarded him steadily for some time. Then he said, ‘Please make sure that I am kept informed.’

  Hrype returned the look. This was, he realized, a man to have on your side. ‘I will,’ he said. And meant it.

  Rollo and I made good time to Cambridge, taking advantage of where we were and where we were bound by going by sea to Wisbech and then down the river to Cambridge. It made such a difference to travelling when you didn’t have to worry about not having any money; Rollo’s coin purse seemed inexhaustible. To a man like him, though, no doubt our expenditure seemed modest in the extreme.

  I realized, as we progressed smoothly over the dark water, that at some point we must have begun to follow the boat that had unwittingly towed the body of the man in the fen to Cambridge . . .

  We tied up at the quayside late the following day. I led the way down the road towards the centre of the town, crossing the market square and diving off into the maze of alleyways that led to Gurdyman’s house. I knocked on the door, and it opened almost instantly; he probably knew I was on my way.

  I saw a big, beaming smile spread across his face. He turned to speak over his shoulder: ‘She’s here!’

  Another figure materialized out of the shadows, and Hrype strode down the passage and briefly took hold of me by my shoulders, looking intently into my eyes. ‘You are unharmed,’ he said. It was not a question; he knew I was.

  Then he saw who I had brought with me, and his entire body went very still. He glared at Rollo, a fierceness in his eyes that I had rarely seen before. I turned to say something to Rollo and observed that he was glaring right back.

  Gurdyman intervened. He pushed Hrype unceremoniously away from the doorway – only Gurdyman, I reflected, would have dared shove Hrype so firmly – and ushered Rollo and me inside. ‘Go on into the courtyard,’ he murmured to me. ‘Take your friend and help yourselves to food and wine. It’s all set out ready.’

  He had known I was coming. It was both a thrilling and a rather scary thought.

  I very much wanted to stay and listen to what Gurdyman was saying so urgently to Hrype, but I did not dare. I took Rollo’s hand and led him down the passage and through the archway into the courtyard. It was still warm from the day’s sunshine and lit with the soft golden light of evening. Wine, goblets and a platter of bread, cheese and dried meat had been set out, but neither Rollo nor I were hungry. We did, however, both pour out wine, and Rollo raised his goblet to me in a silent toast.

  Then Gurdyman came out into the courtyard, Hrype close behind. Gurdyman gave me a quick glance of apology, then said, ‘You are welcome, both of you.’ There was a definite emphasis on both. ‘There are grave matters for us to discuss,’ he went on, ‘but before we can do so, Hrype wishes to speak.’ He shot an irritated glance at Hrype. ‘Go on, then,’ he said tersely.

  Hrype stared at Rollo. ‘You are a Norman,’ he said baldly. He narrowed his eyes. ‘There is something else in your blood that I do not recognize, but your allegiance is to the king.’

  ‘It is,’ Rollo said coldly. ‘Not because he is a Norman, but because I have seen strife tear a land apart, and I believe peace is better. A strong ruler on the throne brings peace.’

  ‘We were used to life under our own kings!’ Hrype replied. ‘We had no need of the brute force of William and his son to bestow their peace on us!’ He all but spat the word.

  Rollo made no reply but for an ironically raised eyebrow. I thought for a moment that Hrype was going to hit him, but, with a very obvious effort, he held back.

  I could not have stood it if they had fought. I stepped between then and said, ‘Hrype, Rollo is my choice. Do not judge him by what you believe him to be; wait and discover for yourself what he truly is.’

  I intercepted a look between Hrype and Gurdyman. There was a message in it, for I could tell that Gurdyman was urgently putting a thought into Hrype’s head, although I could not tell what it was. Hrype made himself relax, and the tension went out of the air.

  ‘We shall sit down and have some wine,’ Gurdyman said, in the sort of tone that does not allow dissent, ‘and then we shall all reveal what we have discovered and what we think we should do next.’

  Rollo and I sat down on a bench; Hrype subsided, with very obvious reluctance, on to a stool; and Gurdyman walked round and poured more of the lovely, cool white wine into each of our goblets. Then he sat down in his own chair, took a slow and appreciative sip and said, ‘Hrype informs me that the real Father Clement left Crowland back in November, visited his bishop over in Lynn at the end of that month and then, it seems, was murdered soon after he left Lynn for Chatteris. Another man now poses as Father Clement at Chatteris, and we surmise that this man probably murdered the real Father Clement, although we do not know why. This impostor also killed a young nun at Chatteris and attempted to poison another, who is sister to Lassair here. Again, we suggest no motive. Now, Lassair –’ he glanced at me with a smile, which he then turned on Rollo – ‘what have you and your friend to tell us?’

  I nudged Rollo. ‘You’d better go first,’ I muttered. I did not know how much of his secret mission he would be prepared to reveal to two men he’d only just met, one of them distinctly hostile, and, as it turned out, the answer was not very much.

  ‘There was a violent storm off the east coast last September,’ Rollo said. ‘There’s a rumour that it was raised deliberately, to destroy the king’s ship-army, which was on its way to the north of England.’

  ‘Raised deliberately?’ Hrype’s sudden interest seemed to be overcoming his antipathy. ‘You speak of a tempestarius?’

  ‘I do,’ Rollo said shortly. He glanced at me. ‘Lassair tells me such people are not unheard of among your kind, and I do not speak of the strange legends and tall tales of the Magonians.’

  Gurdyman went straight to the point. ‘This storm, you think, was raised by someone who supported the king’s enemies in the north? Who wished to hamper the king in his retaliatory measures by removing half his army?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Gurdyman thought about that. ‘Scotland is by no means entirely under the rule of King Malcolm,’ he said. ‘The northern and the western reaches of the land are Norse and Gaelic, and neither people look kindly on King Malcolm and his queen, for Margaret is a forcibly Christian woman and wishes her entire country to be as devout as she is herself.’ He paused. ‘And the ability to raise storms was said to be a particular talent of the Norsemen who lived in the
lands now ruled by Malcolm and his rigid wife.’

  That was all very well, but in my opinion we were drifting away from the main point. ‘We should look at what connects the activities of the storm-raiser and the killing of Father Clement,’ I said decisively. Three pairs of male eyes turned to stare at me, with varying amounts of warmth in them, but I pressed on. ‘Rollo and I have fairly convincing proof that the storm-raiser carried out his magic up on the northern tip of the land, where the ancient wood circle once stood at the crossing place.’ Briefly, I described what we had learned and what we had experienced up there. Neither Hrype nor Gurdyman argued with our conclusion. ‘The nearest settlement of any size to the spot where the storm hit is Lynn, which is where Father Clement was last seen and near to where his body was left. In addition, the little nun who was killed at Chatteris came from up beyond Lynn.’ I echoed the exact words of the cheese-selling woman who had told me this. ‘She arrived at Chatteris last September.’

  I knew the month was significant, and I was just working out why when Rollo opened his mouth to speak.

  But Hrype got there first. ‘Supposing she saw the storm-raiser,’ he said slowly. ‘Supposing she was making her way around the favourite places she had known all her short life, saying goodbye before she went off to her new existence at Chatteris.’

  ‘He realized she’d seen him,’ Rollo went on, picking up the story, ‘and he knew he had to prevent her telling anyone what she saw. He and his fellow conspirators discovered where she had gone, and they learned that, by sheer good fortune, a new priest was on his way to the abbey where the girl had gone.’

  ‘Her name was Herleva,’ I said. It was bad enough that she had lost her life, and I did not see why she should also lose her identity.

  ‘Where Herleva had gone,’ Rollo amended. He gave me a quick look, and I saw from his eyes that he understood. ‘I am sorry,’ he muttered, for my ears only.

  ‘He consulted with the others,’ he continued, ‘and they selected the most suitable of them for the task of removing Father Clement and replacing him.’ He frowned. ‘How would one of them have managed to impersonate a priest so well that a whole abbey was convinced?’

  I’d been wondering the same thing. I had seen how someone like Hrype could change his appearance so thoroughly that even his nearest and dearest wouldn’t recognize him, but we were speaking here of a man pretending to be a priest, which would surely be incredibly risky, full of potential pitfalls at almost every moment of the day . . .

  ‘Perhaps he had once been a priest,’ Hrype mused.

  ‘Or else had been put in a monastery school and thus able to observe the habits and the manners of a priest at close and constant quarters,’ Gurdyman added.

  ‘Are all priests exactly the same?’ I asked of no one in particular.

  Gurdyman glanced at the others, then replied. ‘They are all taught the same things, and of course the entire cannon of dogma is common to all, but no doubt there are small variations in their behaviour.’

  ‘Nobody at Chatteris knew Father Clement before he arrived,’ I went on, developing the thought as I spoke, ‘and anyway, they are nuns, used to obedience and accepting what their priest said and did without question.’

  ‘So no one would have remarked on it,’ Rollo finished, ‘if this false Father Clement had not performed every single act in precisely the same way his predecessor had done.’

  ‘Exactly.’ I gave him a smile.

  ‘This man, then, killed Father Clement in order to get into Chatteris and silence the nun – Herleva – who saw his colleague raise the storm,’ Hrype said. ‘He also tried to poison Herleva’s best friend, Elfritha, because he suspected that Herleva had revealed the secret to her. Is that what you are saying?’

  ‘Yes,’ Rollo and I said together.

  Hrype looked at Gurdyman, and I could see that neither was convinced.

  ‘Have you a better suggestion?’ I demanded.

  Gurdyman smiled. ‘For my part, no. Hrype?’

  With obvious reluctance, slowly Hrype shook his head.

  It was too late to set out there and then, for twilight was coming on and Hrype, Rollo and I were all very tired. Gurdyman busied himself preparing more food, and we drank quite a lot more wine. Then Gurdyman set out paillasses

  and warm woollen blankets in the courtyard for Hrype and Rollo – I wondered, not without amusement, how the two men would manage to sleep just a few feet from each other with the antagonism crackling between them like lightning – and I climbed the ladder to the peace and comfort of my little room up in the attic. I had not realized how worn out I was, and I started to drift into sleep as soon as I had lain down.

  The last thing I was aware of was Gurdyman’s voice. I do not think he was actually speaking to me; I think I heard him only in my mind, for I knew he had gone down into his crypt to sleep.

  His words suggested he was giving me a warning.

  Very early the next morning, when the eastern sky was just beginning to suffuse with the pink of dawn, Hrype, Rollo and I set out for Chatteris. Gurdyman had woken us and fed us, providing food and drink for the journey. As he bade us farewell, I wondered why he wasn’t coming with us. He read the thought and gave me a totally unexpected hug. ‘I am too old for travelling and would slow you down,’ he murmured, adding, ‘but it’s nice to be wanted.’

  I looked back at him as he stood in the open doorway, his lips moving silently. I guessed he was putting his own brand of protection on us.

  When we reached the island, I was so full of the need to see my sister that I kept forgetting that was not why we were there. Hrype had assured me again and again that when last he saw her she had been starting to improve, but even he had to admit that virtually anything could have happened in the meantime. Rollo, understanding my anxiety and my fear, kept close beside me, and I took strength from him. I hadn’t needed to tell him how much I loved Elfritha, since he seemed already to know.

  As we approached the abbey, he stared intently at its walls and the surrounding terrain. Then, with a brief nod, he called softly to Hrype, who stopped and turned to face him.

  ‘I will keep watch from up there.’ He indicated a low rise about twenty or thirty paces to the left of the abbey gates, where a stand of trees grew close to the wall. ‘I’ll climb the tree closest to the wall.’ He glanced at me, then turned to Hrype. ‘Lassair told me how the two of you disguised yourselves on the previous occasions you were here, and it’ll cause fewer interested glances if the same pair visit again.’

  Hrype nodded curtly. Even he, it seemed, could see nothing to argue with there. Then he and I went through the process of turning ourselves into an old man and his waddling daughter, and we set off for the abbey.

  Again, I had the definite impression that our arrival was expected. The nun who had met us the last time we were there was standing in the doorway of the infirmary, her thin, angular face tense with anxiety.

  My heart began to thud painfully in my chest. Had she come to forewarn us of what we would find inside? Oh, Elfritha!

  Hrype had stepped forward and was speaking urgently to her. ‘Sister Christiana, what has happened?’

  But she was smiling now, her face transformed, and as she reached out to take each of our hands, I saw tears in her eyes. ‘Elfritha is much better!’ she said, her expression radiant. ‘Edild has just been feeding her soup, and she has taken a whole cup! Come in, come in, and see for yourselves!’

  We hurried in her wake down the length of the infirmary. I had the impression of several pairs of eyes watching us with interest, but I barely noticed. Then we were hurrying up the dark passage and through the open door into the little room, and there was my beloved sister, propped up on pillows, pale and feeble-looking, but smiling so widely that I could not help but respond. ‘Elfritha, you’re – you’re—!’

  It was no time for words. I leapt forward and, sinking to my knees, took my sister in my arms and held her so close that I could feel her heartbeat. We staye
d like that for some moments – not speaking, not moving – then I felt a light touch on my shoulder and Edild’s quiet voice said, ‘Let her go now, Lassair. She is still very weak.’

  I turned to look at her. Sister Christiana had disappeared – presumably out of tact, to give us some quiet time together – and Edild stood within Hrype’s arms. I stared up at my aunt.

  Oh, I had so much to tell her . . . She had predicted that Rollo would come back into my life. How right she had been. I was about to tell her so when Hrype spoke.

  ‘Lassair’s got her Norman with her,’ he said. ‘It appears he, too, has an involvement in this business.’

  Edild flinched at the harsh emphasis he put on the word Norman. She turned to look at Hrype. ‘I imagine that Lassair’s life has become entwined with his for reasons and purposes far above political allegiance,’ she replied. Then, her expression softening, she added quietly, ‘Do not judge, Hrype. Lassair is too wise to fall in love with someone unworthy of her.’

  I didn’t think I was supposed to have heard that, so I pretended to be busy smoothing over Elfritha’s bedding. She was, however, fizzing with interest. ‘Who is he, Lassair?’ she hissed, her eyes huge. ‘Is he handsome? Are you very much in love?’

  I took her sweet, too thin face in my hands and gently kissed her cheek. ‘Wait and see,’ I whispered back.

  Edild disengaged herself from Hrype and, taking his hand, drew him forward to kneel beside Elfritha and me, crouching down at his side. She said, very quietly. ‘Elfritha has something to tell you.’ She took my sister’s hand. ‘Are you strong enough to talk?’ she asked.

  Elfritha nodded. Her expression grave, she composed herself, then said, ‘Not long before Herleva died, she told me something. I didn’t think any more about it at the time, because she – well, she loved to tell tales, and she often entertained us at night with her ghost stories. She was always getting into trouble for it and—’ She broke off, but quickly recovered. ‘Anyway, I only realized it could be relevant when I started to feel a bit better and Edild told me what had happened: how she thought I’d been poisoned, and that someone had tried to kill me.’ She paused again, and her eyes were full of horror.