The Widow's Tale (Sister Frevisse Medieval Mysteries Book 14) Page 7

  * * *

  A few days after that the church was again softly golden with westering sunlight and Cristiana was again alone in front of the altar in the hour before Compline. As she had come toward the church after supper, she had seen Sister Thomasine among the nuns going through the narrow slype toward the tall-walled garden beyond the cloister to spend their hour’s recreation, but now when she heard a slight, soft footfall behind her, she supposed she was come after all, until the nun who stopped beside her did not kneel, instead said, “Cristiana,” and when Cristiana jerked up her head to look at her, added, “I want to speak with you.”

  Wary both of the nun and her own stiff knees, Cristiana stood up unsteadily.

  The nun, her hands tucked into her opposite sleeves, made no move to help her, simply waited until she was standing, then said, “I’m Dame Frevisse.”

  Cristiana had learned a few of the nuns’ names by chance, but mostly she knew them as “the older nun who talked too much,”

  “the young nun who stared,”

  “the nun with her nose in the air.” This one was “the tall nun who had been at the guesthall.” Not knowing what lies Milisent had said to her then, Cristiana set her lips tightly together, determined not to be lured into speaking. The nun made a slight nod, accepting her silence, but said, “Since you confessed to Father Henry, he’s been openly unhappy. It seems to be a troubled unhappy rather than weighed-with-sin unhappy. Do you see the difference? Do you understand?”

  Cristiana gave a curt nod that she did. Was she supposed to be stupid as well as sinful?

  “He of course can say nothing about your confession, but he’s asked that your penance of bread and water be eased.” Cristiana felt hope quicken. If only she weren’t so hungry all the time, if only she could think more clearly . . .

  “Domina Elisabeth has agreed to write to Abbot Gilberd about it,” the nun continued.

  Cristiana’s hope dwindled. Letters took time and permission might well not come, not if this Abbot Gilberd believed all that Laurence must have told him.

  “In the meanwhile, since we are allowed to speak to you on necessary and immediate matters, and because as hosteler I have to consider the well-being of our priory’s guests—which in some sense you are—I have determined that knowing how you are in both your body and mind is a necessary and immediate matter. Because you are charged not to speak except in answer to questions, I’m asking you if there anything I can do to help you?”

  Cristiana gulped for air along with hope, half a score of things racing through her mind before she grabbed at one that had been heavy on her all these days. “Please,” she said and heard her desperation raw in her voice. “Where am I?” Dame Frevisse’s eyes narrowed. “You were never told where they were taking you?”

  “No one told me anything. I was taken suddenly and by force in my own house. I was blindfolded and gagged and kept tied in a curtained litter until we were nearly here.” The nightmare of it rose again in a black wave. Her voice shook. “Three days. And at night I was tied to a bed in a locked inn room. I was never told where I was, where I was going.” Quickly, almost as if she understood the pain of that, Dame Frevisse said, “You’re in St. Frideswide’s priory in northern Oxfordshire. You’re near to Banbury.”

  Oxfordshire, Cristiana thought, dismayed. Three far days’ journey west from home.

  “Where do you come from?” the nun asked. “Hertfordshire,” Cristiana said faintly. “Near a place called Broxbourne.”

  “On the main way from London to Walsingham, yes,” Dame Frevisse said. “I’ve passed through it, going to Walsingham. A long time ago.”

  Tears welled hot in Cristiana’s eyes. In this wasteland of hopelessness and strangers, even to know someone knew from where she came was a relief. The tears flowed over and she wiped them from her cheeks almost angrily. She had hoped she was done with crying. What use was she going to be to even herself if such small mercy as this undid her?

  Ignoring her tears, Dame Frevisse said, “You say you were seized without warning …”

  “And falsely!” Cristiana said, not heeding that was not yet a question. “I told the priest and I’ll swear on anything you ask that I’ve done none of the things I’m accused of! My husband died and they took my daughters. They—“

  Dame Frevisse stopped her with a quickly lifted hand. “Abbot Gilberd in his letter—“

  “I don’t even know this Abbot Gilberd! He can only know what Laurence—he’s my husband’s cousin, he’s the one who’s done this—he can only know what Laurence told him. Laurence wants all the Helyngton lands for himself. He’s persuaded the duke of Suffolk to give him my daughters and our lands by lying about me, but it’s all false! I swear …” Something in Dame Frevisse’s face stopped her; hope drained out of her to discouragement again and bitterly she said, “You don’t believe any of this, do you?”

  Her face shadowed by a frown, Dame Frevisse said, “I think I rather more believe you than not. But I don’t see yet what I can do to help you.”

  Cristiana could have wept again, this time with her discouragement.

  But Dame Frevisse went on, “More food and less penance, to begin with. I’ll do what I can for that. Try not to despair too deeply.”

  Dame Frevisse started to turn away, but Cristiana said urgently, “Please!”

  The nun turned back to her and Cristiana tumbled out, “If a man named Sir Gerveys should come here—Sir Gerveys Drury—please, for God’s mercy, tell him I’m here.” Doubt rose in the nun’s face at this sudden mention of a man. More desperately Cristiana said, “He’s my brother. He’ll be trying to find me.” She had to believe that or utterly despair. “If he comes, please, tell him I’m here.”

  Considering, Dame Frevisse said slowly, “No one has forbidden us to say you’re here. If anyone comes asking for you, they’ll be told.”

  “Thank you,” Cristiana whispered.

  Dame Frevisse gave a short nod and left her. Cristiana watched her black-gowned back until she was gone, remembering when she had been as certain in herself and place as the nun was. When there had been Edward and Mary and Jane and home and her whole world sure around her.

  With her tears burned dry again, she turned back to the altar and knelt to pray for Laurence’s death and for Gerveys to come for her. Soon.

  Soon.

  * * *

  Frevisse paced alone along the cloister walk, head bowed, watching the paving stones pass beneath her skirts. Should she confess, either to Domina Elisabeth or else to Father Henry, that she had talked with Cristiana? Her justification for it was, at best, of doubtful worth. Still, it had served, however little. She knew more than she had known. But how much of it did she believe? That the woman was from Broxbourne in Hertfordshire was probably true; and that she desperately hoped a man named Gerveys would find her. He might even be her brother. For the rest of it, she had indeed been bound and gagged while being brought here, and while that could have been to keep her under necessary control because she was not fully sane, she had given no sign of either madness or violence while she was here. Although if she were as corrupt as she was accused of being, she was mad, even if not violent. Thus far, though, she had been obedient enough, with no sign of anything but grief about her.

  And anger, Frevisse amended. Most of what she had said just now had assuredly been bitter and desperate with anger, with no sign at all of penitence. Anger, grief, bitterness, desperation. But no penitence. And yet Father Henry, deeply troubled about something, was apparently not troubled about that.

  And as much as anything Cristiana’s claim that the duke of Suffolk had helped her husband’s cousin in wronging her unsettled Frevisse and gave weight to her protest of innocence. All too well Frevisse knew that William de la Pole, duke of Suffolk was not overly given to honesty or justice if they were in his way to something he wanted. She could believe far too easily that, given reason or money enough, he might well have helped this Laurence as Cristiana claimed.

&nb
sp; But none of that solved or settled anything, only raised new questions, and almost Frevisse could have wished she had not started it.

  Chapter 6

  August was come, the days heavy with heat, the nights thick with warmth, the square , garth at the cloister’s heart close-grown with flowers and herbs in their full summer flourish. Passing around the cloister walk to the church after her afternoon lesson with Dame Perpetua, Cristiana paused beside the low wall between the walk and the garth to take pleasure in the flaunt of colors in a way she had never done in her garden at home. At home there had been so much else as well to please the eye and pleasure the mind and heart. Here in St. Frideswide’s there was so little of anything, the nunnery was so small and unwealthy, with no luxuria anywhere. In the church the altar cloth and the priest’s Mass garments were beautifully embroidered and the silver-plated altar goods were kept faultlessly polished, but the altar goods were old—Cristiana had seen where some of the plating was worn almost through—and the altar steps were bare, with no carpet or decorated tiles, only the same plain stone as the floor she lay on, the stones cool under her even now, so far into summer. When winter came, the cold of those stones would cut through the linen of her chemise and gown into her flesh, into her bones.

  Sometimes, in an unguarded moment, she wondered if she would be given a warmer gown come wintertime; then the thought that she would still be here when winter came frightened her as much as thought of the cold. But at least she was no longer left completely alone. Whether by Dame Frevisse’s doing or Father Henry’s or simply because she had been no trouble thus far, some of the rigor against her had lately eased. She still had three days a week of bread and water, no word having come yet from this Abbot Gilberd, but on the other days her portion of food was greater than it had been. No one had said why; it simply was. And although the silence against her was still kept, she sometimes had lessons with Dame Perpetua on understanding the Offices. Dame Perpetua enjoyed teaching and was good at it; sometimes Cristiana now understood some of the things said above her during the prayers. More than that, though, she was relieved to be given something other to think about than her fear and anger, and there was comfort in having someone talk to her.

  But if the nuns had begun to have better hope that time would come when she would become a nun, hope was all they would ever have of it, she thought bitterly. Standing there beside the garth’s low wall, she looked up from the gaudy yellow of the St. John’s Wort to the shiningly blue sky above the cloister’s roof-ridges that was all she ever saw of the world outside the nunnery. Sky and nunnery walls had become her world and, oh, by St. Anne, her own hope was sometimes hard to hold to. Those walls could so easily outlast her and she was so weary with waiting.

  Head bowed with that thought and her hands folded together over her hurting heart, she went onward to the church the way she was supposed to do in any idle time she had and knelt before the altar and prayed with the desperation that came over her whenever her fear of never escaping from here was more than usual. How many weeks had it been now?

  She was still rapidly murmuring for release when she heard a nun’s soft step behind her but went on praying until a hand touched her shoulder. Just loud enough for the nun to hear, she said, “Amen,” and looked up to find Sister Amicia there.

  Stiffly, being one of the nuns who ever made a point of staying well away from her, Sister Amicia said, “There’s a man to see you.”

  Cristiana’s heart lurched. Gerveys.

  “Domina Elisabeth says you can see him in the guest parlor. He’s Master Helyngton, she says.”

  Christiana’s heart lurched again, downward this time. Making no move to rise, she only stared at Sister Amicia until the nun said impatiently, “Now,” and walked away.

  Stumblingly, Cristiana stood up. Not Gerveys. Laurence.

  Her mind went empty, unable to handle the sudden shift to hope and out of it again into new fear. Through a fog of unthinking she followed Sister Amicia from the church. Two nuns were working at the desks along the church wall, their pen scratching loud in the cloister’s quiet. The guest parlor was beyond them and around a corner of the walk, beside the passage from the cloister’s outer door, but Sister Amicia was going the other way, and Cristiana stopped, taking time to gather her wits. Was she supposed to see Laurence alone?

  Not Gerveys. Laurence.

  The understanding that Laurence was here and she was to see him finally took hold on her. She lifted her head. Very well then. Laurence. She was here on his terms. Whyever he was here now, it was on his terms, too. If nothing else—and he had left her nothing else—she would meet him on her terms. Even if that meant no more than not going to him immediately. And rather than toward the guest parlor, she went the other way around the cloister walk, to the refectory where the nuns ate. Just inside the door a basin and a water-filled pitcher sat on a bench and a clean linen towel hung on the wall above them, waiting for hands to be washed before and after meals. Steadily, making no haste about it, Cristiana poured some of the marjorem-scented water into the basin, washed her hands, used a dampened corner of the towel to wipe her face, dried her hands and face, and hung the towel carefully straight on its rod. By feel, she made certain her headkerchief was straight, covering as much of her hair as possible. There was nothing to be done about her gown. Besides the gray gown she had worn at first, she had been given this equally gray, more coarsely woven one to wear turn and turnabout when one and then the other was being laundered. All that could be done for it was to shake out the skirts before she folded her hands over each other at her waist and went out and on around the cloister walk to the guest parlor, trying to believe she was ready to face Laurence.

  The guest parlor was a small, bare room where nuns were allowed to meet with relatives or others who might come to see them. The white plastered walls were plain, there were a bench, a few joint stools, a small table for use if food and drink were given, nothing else. Stopping in the doorway, Cristiana saw, first, Laurence standing beside the table, his fingers unevenly tapping at it with impatience, and then—to her relief—Dame Frevisse standing against the wall beside the door. She would be why Cristiana had heard no knocking at the outer door; she must have been at the guesthall when Laurence arrived and had seen him into the nunnery herself.

  Her presence made Cristiana more bold and she said at Laurence before he could say anything, “You asked to see me?” ungraciously enough to leave him with no doubt she was not yet broken.

  He returned her ungraciousness with his own, a slight lift to his lip as he eyed her before saying, “You’re doing well, I see.”

  “Well enough. What do you want?”

  “Your help.”

  Because neither screaming at him nor damning him to hell would be any use, Cristiana went on staring at him, saying nothing.

  “With Mary,” he said.

  Knowing he counted on that rousing her, Cristiana kept her face blank. That she could do it so well frightened her. For weeks-lost-count-of she had been praying for her daughters, and here was Laurence offering her word of Mary and she was able to stand there staring at him, showing nothing, saying nothing.

  Sharply, not liking her silence, Laurence said, “We’re trying to marry her to Clement as we planned.”

  “As you planned,” Cristiana said sharply back at him. “Not Edward or I.”

  “Edward and you are beside the point now. The point is she won’t do it. She won’t even accept betrothal to him. When we try, she screams at us, says she won’t say the words and never will. She bit the priest when he took her hand to give it to Clement, and she hit Clement in the face with her fist when he tried to kiss her.”

  Warmth spread around Cristiana’s heart. Mary was well, then, and being brave. “And Jane?” she asked, keeping her voice level. “Is she well, too?”

  “She’s well, too,” Laurence snapped. “Better than Mary will be, the way Mary is going, and no, that’s not a threat against your miserable daughter. She’s doing i
t to herself. Making herself sick with her glooming and crying and not eating. Milisent says she’ll be ill and no use if she goes on this way.”

  Hearing that, Cristiana kept her face blank only with difficulty but said with cold satisfaction, “Nor can you marry Jane to him instead because she’s too young. Besides, you’d have to wait that much longer for her to bear your Clement a child, to make the inheritance secure.”

  “Yes,” Lawrence agreed tightly. “That’s why Eve come for you. To take you back so you can persuade Mary to this marriage.”

  Cristiana stared at him, not quite grasping what he was offering her.

  Probably impatient at her silence, Laurence snapped, “Do you understand what I’m telling you? If you’ll swear that you’ll quiet Mary down, that you’ll persuade her to this marriage and see her through the wedding, I’ll take you back with me. You’ll be out of here today.” His voice dropped into a darker tone. “Otherwise, we’ll have to find a way to force her to it. It can’t be that difficult a choice, woman. Make it.”

  He was right: it was not a difficult choice. Cristiana’s heart leaped with her answer; but the cold back part of her mind held her silent a moment longer. She was finding there was something in her that was like the hard cinder left when all lesser matter had been burned away. Her weeks of fear and grief here had done that to her—or for her. Had burned away the parts of her that had been simply loving, had simply wanted to care and be cared for; had burned away her simpleness and left her with the unyielding wall of determination to have back what Laurence had taken from her. To have her home and her daughters and her life—and to destroy Laurence, and Milisent, too, if it were at all possible. And here he was, offering her at least hope of that chance somehow to strike against him. Against them.

  So, no, her choice was not difficult at all, and letting her shoulders drop and her gaze fall as if she were defeated by his strength, she said in a small voice, “I’ll make all well about the marriage. I swear it.”