Brother Cadfael 08: The Devil's Novice

apparition bearing down on them, and broke away with agitated clucking like so many flurried hens. In the very threshold of his small domain Meriet came nose to nose with Brother Jerome emerging.
    On the face of it, it was a very uneven confrontation: a mere postulant of a month or so, and one who had already given trouble and been cautioned, facing a man in authority, the prior's right hand, a cleric and confessor, one of the two appointed for the novices. The check did give Meriet pause for one moment, and Cadfael leaned to his ear to whisper breathlessly: 'Hold back, you fool! He'll have your hide!' He might have saved the breath of which he was short, for Meriet did not even hear him. The moment when he might have come to his senses was already past, for his eye had fallen on the small, bright thing Jerome dangled before him from outraged fingers, as though it were unclean. The boy's face blanched, not with the pallor of fear, but the blinding whiteness of pure anger, every line of bone in a strongly-boned countenance chiselled in ice.
    'That is mine,' he said with soft and deadly authority, and held out his hand. 'Give it to me!'
    Brother Jerome rose on tiptoe and swelled like a turkey-cock at being addressed in such tones. His thin nose quivered with affronted rage. 'And you openly avow it? Do you not know, impudent wretch, that in asking for admittance here you have forsworn "mine," and may not possess property of any kind? To bring in any personal things here without the lord abbot's permission is flouting the Rule. It is a sin! But wilfully to bring with you this-this! is to offend foully against the very vows you say you desire to take. And to cherish it in your bed is a manner of fornication. Do you dare? Do you dare? You shall be called to account for it!'
    All eyes but Meriet's were on the innocent cause of offence; Meriet maintained a burning stare upon his adversary's face. And all the secret charm turned out to be was a delicate linen ribbon, embroidered with flowers in blue and gold and red, such a band as a girl would use to bind her hair, and knotted into its length a curl of that very hair, reddish gold.
    'Do you so much as know the meaning of the vows you say you wish to take?' fumed Jerome. 'Celibacy, poverty, obedience, stability - is there any sign in you of any of these? Take thought now, while you may, renounce all thought of such follies and pollutions as this vain thing implies, or you cannot be accepted here. Penance for this backsliding you will not escape, but you have time to amend, if there is any grace in you.'
    'Grace enough, at any rate,' said Meriet, unabashed and glittering, 'to keep my hands from prying into another man's sheets and stealing his possessions. Give me,' he said through his teeth, very quietly, 'what is mine!'
    'We shall see, insolence, what the lord abbot has to say of your behaviour. Such a vain trophy as this you may not keep. And as for your insubordination, it shall be reported faithfully. Now let me pass!' ordered Jerome, supremely confident still of his dominance and his tightness.
    Whether Meriet mistook his intention, and supposed that it was simply a matter of sweeping the entire issue into chapter for the abbot's judgment, Cadfael could never be sure. The boy might have retained sense enough to accept that, even if it meant losing his simple little treasure in the end; for after all, he had come here of his own will, and at every check still insisted that he wanted with all his heart to be allowed to remain and take his vows. Whatever his reason, he did step back, though with a frowning and dubious face, and allowed Jerome to come forth into the corridor.
    Jerome turned towards the night-stairs, where the lamp was still burning, and all his mute myrmidons followed respectfully. The lamp stood in a shallow bowl on a bracket on the wall, and was guttering towards its end. Jerome reached it, and before either Cadfael or Meriet realised what he was about, he had drawn the gauzy ribbon through the flame. The tress of hair hissed and vanished in a small flare of gold, the ribbon fell apart in two charred halves, and smouldered in the bowl. And Meriet, without a sound uttered, launched himself like a hound leaping, straight at Brother Jerome's throat. Too late to grasp at his cowl and try to restrain him, Cadfael lunged after.
    No question but Meriet meant to kill. This was no noisy brawl, all bark and no bite, he had his hands round the scrawny throat,