Brother Cadfael 01: A Morbid Taste for Bones

at him with measuring scorn. "I thought you were his friend!"
    "So I am his friend," said Peredur, paling but steadfast. "I said what I believe of myself, no less than of him."
    "What is this matter of one Engelard?" demanded Prior Robert, left behind in this exchange. "Tell me what they are saying." And when Cadfael had done so, as tersely as possible: "It would seem that at least this young man must be asked to account for his movements this day," decreed Robert, appropriating an authority to which he had no direct right here. "It may be that others have been with him, and can vouch for him. But if not..."
    "He set out this morning with your father," said Huw, distressfully eyeing the girl's fixed and defiant face. "You told us so. They went together as far as the cleared fields. Then your father turned to make his way down to us, and Engelard was to go a mile beyond, to the byres where the cows were in calf. We must send out and ask if any man has seen your father since he parted from Engelard. Is there any who can speak to that?"
    There was a silence. The numbers gathered about them were growing steadily. Some of the slower searchers from the open ride had made their way up here without news of their own, to find the matter thus terribly resolved. Others, hearing rumours of the missing man, had followed from the village. Father Huw's messenger came up behind with Brother Columbanus and Brother Jerome from the chapel. But no one spoke up to say he had seen Rhisiart that day. Nor did any volunteer word of having encountered Engelard.
    "He must be questioned," said Prior Robert, "and if his answers are not satisfactory, he must be held and handed over to the bailiff. For it's clear from what has been said that this man certainly had a motive for wishing to remove Rhisiart from his path."
    "Motive?" blazed Sioned, burning up abruptly as a dark and quiet fire suddenly spurts flame. Instinctively she recoiled into Welsh, though she had already revealed how well she could follow what was said around her in English, and the chief reason for her reticence concerning her knowledge had been cruelly removed. "Not so strong a motive as you had, Father Prior! Every soul in this parish knows what store you set upon getting Saint Winifred away from us, what glory it will be to your abbey, and above all, to you. And who stood in your way but my father? Yours, not the saint's! Show me a better reason for wanting him dead! Did any ever wish to lift hand against him, all these years! Until you came here with your quest for Winifred's relics? Engelard's disagreement with my father was constant and understood, yours was new and urgent. Our need could wait, we're young. Yours could not wait. And who knew better than you at what hour my father would be coming through the forest to Gwytherin? Or that he would not change his mind?"
    Father Huw spread a horrified hand to hush her long before this, but she would not be hushed. "Child, child, you must not make such dreadful accusations against the reverend prior, it is mortal sin."
    "I state facts, and let them speak," snapped Sioned. "Where's the offence in that? Prior Robert may point out the facts that suit him, I showed you the others, those that do not suit him. My father was the sole obstacle in his path, and my father has been removed."
    "Child, I tell you every soul in this valley knew that your father was coming to my house, and the hour of his coming, and many would know all the possible ways, far better than any of these good brethren from Shrewsbury. The occasion might well suit another grudge. And you must know that Prior Robert has been with me, and with Brother Richard and Brother Cadfael here, ever since morning Mass." And Father Huw turned in agitated supplication to Robert, wringing his hands. "Father Prior, I beg you, do not hold it against the girl that she speaks so wildly. She is in grief - a father lost... You cannot wonder if she turns on us all."
    "I say no word of blame," said the prior, though coldly. "I gather she is casting doubts upon myself and my companions, but doubtless, you have answered her. Tell the young woman, in my name, that both you and others here can witness for my own person, for all this day I have been within your sight."
    Grateful for at least one certainty, Huw turned to repeat as much to Sioned yet again, but she blazed back with biting promptness and force, forgetting all restraints in the need to confront Robert face to face, without the