Brother Cadfael 04: St. Peter's Fair

came back from a final patrol along the Foregate well past ten o'clock, an hour when all dutiful brothers should have been fast asleep in the dortoir. He was by no means surprised to find that Cadfael was not. They met in the great court, as Cadfael came back from closing his workshop in the herb-garden. It was still a clear twilight, and the west had a brilliant afterglow.
    "I hear you've been in the thick of it," said Hugh, stretching and yawning. "Did ever I know you when you were not? Mad young fools, what did they hope to do, that their elders could not! And then to run wild as they did, and ruin their case even with those who had sympathy for them! Now their sires will have fines to pay, and the town lose more for the night's work than ever it stood to gain. Cadfael, I take no joy in heaving decent, silly lads into prison, I have a foul taste in my mouth from it. Come into the gatehouse for a while, and share a cup with me. You may as well stay awake until Matins now."
    "Aline will be waiting for you," objected Cadfael. "Aline, bless her good sense, will be fast asleep, for I'm bound to the castle yet to report on this disturbance. I doubt I shall be there over the night. Come and tell me how all this went wrong, for they tell me it began down at the jetty, where you were."
    Cadfael went with him willingly. They sat together in the anteroom of the gatehouse, and the porter, used to such nocturnal activities when the deputy sheriff of the shire was lodged within, brought them wine, made tolerant enquiry of progress, and left them to their colloquy.
    "How many have you taken up?" asked Cadfael, when he had given an account of what had happened by the river.
    "Seventeen. And it should have been eighteen," owned Hugh grimly, "if I had not hauled Bellecote's boy Edwy aside without witnesses, put the fear of God into him, and sent him home with a flea in his ear. Not sixteen yet! But sharp enough to know very well what he was about, the imp! I should not have done it."
    "His father was one of yesterday's delegates," said Cadfael, "and he's a loyal child, as well as a bold one. I'm glad you let him away home. And young Corviser?"
    "No, we've not laid hand on him, though a dozen witnesses say he was the ringleader, and captained the whole enterprise. But he has to go home some time, and he'll not get in at the gate a free man. Not a hope of it!"
    "He came lecturing like a doctor," said Cadfael seriously, "and never a threatening move. It was when he was struck down that the wild lads took the bit between their teeth and laid about them. I saw it! The man who struck him lashed out in alarm, I grant you, but without cause."
    "I take your word for that, and I'll stand by it. But he led the attack, and he'll end with the rest, as he should, seeing he loosed this on us all. They'll be bailed by their fathers, the lot of them," said Hugh wearily, and passed long fingers over tired eyelids. "Do I seem to you, Cadfael, to be turning horribly into a crown official? That I should not like!"
    "No," said Cadfael judicially, "you're not too far gone. Still a glint in the eye and a quirk in the mind. You'll do yet!"
    "Gracious in you! And you say this Bristol merchant struck the silly wretch down without provocation?"
    "He imagined provocation. The boy laid a detaining hand on his arm from behind, meaning no ill, but the man took fright. He had a staff in his hand, he turned on him and hit out. Felled him like an ox! I doubt if he had the strength to knock the trestle from under a stall, after that. For all I know, he may be fallen out of his senses, somewhere, unless his friends have kept their hands on him."
    Hugh looked at him across the trestle on which their own elbows were spread, and smiled. "If ever I want for an advocate, I'll come running to you. Well, I do know the lad, he has a well-hung tongue, and lets it wag far too freely, and he has a hot temper and a warm heart, and lets the pair of them run away with his own sense - if you claim he has any!"
    The lay porter put his bald brown crown and round red face into the room. "My lord, there's a lady here at the gate has a trouble on her mind, and asks a word. One Mistress Emma Vernold, niece to the merchant Thomas of Bristol. Will you have her come in?"
    They looked at each other across the board with raised brows and startled eyes. "The same man?" said Beringar, marvelling.
    "The same man, surely! And the same girl! But the uproar was all over. What can she be wanting here