Brother Cadfael 08: The Devil's Novice

adventurous life and at a mature age. And both, as I hope and believe, secure in commitment. Tell us, Edmund, how do you look upon this matter? Have you regretted ever that you were denied experience of the world outside these walls?'
    Brother Edmund the infirmarer, only eight years short of Cadfael's robust sixty, and a grave, handsome, thoughtful creature who might have looked equally well on horseback and in arms, or farming a manor and keeping a patron's eye on his tenants, considered the question seriously, and was not disturbed. 'No, I have had no regrets. But neither did I know what there might be worth regretting. And I have known those who did rebel, even wanting that knowledge. It may be they imagined a better world without than is possible in this life, and it may be that I lack that gift of imagination. Or it may be only that I was fortunate in finding work here within to my liking and within my scope, and have been too busy to repine. I would not change. But my choice would have been the same if I had grown to puberty here, and made my vows only when I was grown. I have cause to know that others would have chosen differently, had they been free.'
    'That is fairly spoken,' said Radulfus. 'Brother Cadfael, what of you? You have ranged over much of the world, as far as the Holy Land, and borne arms. Your choice was made late and freely, and I do not think you have looked back. Was that gain, to have seen so much, and yet chosen this small hermitage?'
    Cadfael found himself compelled to think before he spoke, and beneath the comfortable weight of a whole day's sunlight and labour, thought was an effort. He was by no means certain what the abbot wanted from him, but had no doubt whatever of his own indignant discomfort at the notion of a babe in arms being swaddled willy-nilly in the habit he himself had assumed willingly.
    'I think it was gain,' he said at length, 'and moreover, a better gift I brought, flawed and dinted though it might be, than if I had come in my innocence. For I own freely that I had loved my life, and valued high the warriors I had known, and the noble places and great actions I had seen, and if I chose in my prime to renounce all these, and embrace this life of the cloister in preference to all other, then truly I think I paid the best compliment and homage I had to pay. And I cannot believe that anything I hold in my remembrance makes me less fit to profess this allegiance, but rather better fits me to serve as well as I may. Had I been given in infancy, I should have rebelled in manhood, wanting my rights. Free from childhood, I could well afford to sacrifice my rights when I came to wisdom.'
    'Yet you would not deny,' said the abbot, his lean face lit briefly by a smile, 'the fitness of certain others, by nature and grace, to come in early youth to the life you discovered in maturity?'
    'By no means would I deny it! I think those who do so, and with certainty, are the best we have. So they make the choice of their own will, and by their own light.'
    'Well, well!' said Radulfus, and mused with his chin in his hand, and his deep-set eyes shadowed. 'Paul, have you any view to lay before us? You have the boys in charge, and I am well aware they seldom complain of you.' For Brother Paul, middle-aged, conscientious and anxious, like a hen with a wayward brood, was known for his indulgence to the youngest, for ever in defence of mischief, but a good teacher for all that, instilling Latin without pain on either part.
    'It would be no burden to me,' said Paul slowly, 'to care for a little lad of four, but it is of no merit that I should take pleasure in such a charge, or that he should be content. That is not what the Rule requires, or so it seems to me. A good father could do as much for a little son. Better if he come in knowledge of what he does, and with some inkling of what he may be leaving behind him. At fifteen or sixteen years, well taught ... "
    Prior Robert drew back his head and kept his austere countenance, leaving his superior to make up his own mind as he would. Brother Richard the sub-prior had held his tongue throughout, being a good man at managing day-to-day affairs, but indolent at attempting decisions.
    'It has been in my mind, since studying the reasonings of Archbishop Lanfranc,' said the abbot, 'that there must be a change in our thoughts on this matter of child dedication, and I am now convinced that it is better to refuse all oblates until they are able to consider