Brother Cadfael 05: Leper of Saint Giles

crossing at Atcham. One of the begging bowls they held, at least, was legitimate, but they made no appeals to any of those who passed by, and used their warning clappers only if some charitably disposed soul showed signs of approaching too closely. They sat cross-legged and shrouded in the bleached autumnal grass under the trees. The attitudes were easily learned.
    "Just as you are," said Lazarus, "you might walk away through their cordon and go free. They will not believe any man so brave or so mad as to walk in a dead leper's gown, or be themselves so brave or so mad as to risk stripping you to find out." It was a long speech for him, by the end he stumbled, as if his maimed tongue tired of the effort.
    "What, run and save my own skin and leave her still captive? I do not stir from here," said Joscelin vehemently, "while she is still in ward to an uncle who plunders her substance, and will sell her for his own profit. To a worse than Huon de Domville, if the price is right! What use is my freedom to me, if I turn my back on Iveta in her need?"
    "I think," said the slow tongue beside him, "that if truth be told, you want this lady for yourself. Do I belie you?"
    "Not by a hair!" said Joscelin with passion. "I want this lady for myself as I never have wanted and never shall want anything else in this great world. I should want her the same if she lacked not only lands, but shoes on her feet to walk those lands, I should want her if she were what I am feigning to be now, and what you - God be your remedy! - truly are. But for all that, I'd be content - no, grateful! - only to see her safe in the care of a worthy guardian, with all her honours upon her, and free to choose where she would. Surely I'd do my best to win her! But lose her to a better man, yes, that I would, and never complain. Oh, no, you do not belie me! I ache with wanting her!"
    "But what can you do for her, hunted as you are? Is there ever a friend among them you can rely on?"
    "There's Simon," said Joscelin, warming. "He doesn't believe evil of me. He hid me, out of goodwill, it grieves me that I quit the place without a word to him. If I could get a message to him now, he might even be able to speak with her, and have her meet me as she did once before. Now the old man's gone - but how can that ever have come about! - they may not watch her so closely. Simon might even get me my horse ..."
    "And where," asked the patient, detached voice, "would you take this friendless lady, if you got her out of ward?"
    "I've thought of that. I'd take her to the White Ladies at Brewood, and ask sanctuary for her until enquiry could be made into her affairs, and a proper provision made for her. They would not give her up against her will. It would go as far as the king, if need be. He has a good heart, he'd see her justly used. I would a long sight sooner take her to my mother," burst out Joscelin honestly, "but it would be said I coveted her possessions, and that I won't endure. I have two good manors coming to me, I covet no man's lands, I owe no man, and I won't be misprised. If she still chooses me, I'll thank God and her, and be a happy man. But I care most that she should be a happy woman."
    Lazarus reached for his clapper-dish, and set the clapper woodenly clouting, for a plump, solid horseman had halted his pony and turned aside from the road towards them. The rider, nonetheless, smiled from his distance and tossed a coin. Lazarus gathered it and blessed him, and the good man waved a hand and rode on.
    "There is still goodness," said Lazarus, as if to himself.
    "Praise God, there is!" said Joscelin with unaccustomed humility. "I have experienced it. I have never asked you," he said hesitantly, "if you have ever had wife and child. It would be great waste if you had always been solitary."
    There was a lengthy silence, though silences at Lazarus's side were neither rare nor troublesome. At last the old man said: "I had a wife, long dead now. I had a son. He was blessed, in that my shadow never fell upon him."
    Joscelin was startled and indignant. "I don't find you a shadow. Never speak so! Any son of yours might properly joy in his father."
    The old man's head turned, the eyes above the veil shone steadily and piercingly upon his companion. "He never knew," said Lazarus simply. "Hold him excused, he was only an infant. It was my choice, not his."
    Young and blunt and blundering as he was, Joscelin had learned in haste to understand where he might not pass, and