Brother Cadfael 09: Dead Man's Ransom

Brother Everard. Strong constitutions they have, both, in spite of age, and it was no worse than a chest cold, and has cleared up well. Come and see how they all progress. If only we could send out Brother Maurice with the same satisfaction as those two,' said Edmund sadly. 'He's eight years younger, strong and able, and barely sixty. If only he was as sound in mind as in body! But I doubt we'll never dare let him loose. It's the bent his madness has taken. Shame that after a blameless life of devotion he now remembers only his grudges, and seems to have no love for any man. Great age is no blessing, Cadfael, when the body's strength outlives the mind.'
    'How do his neighbours bear with him?' asked Cadfael with sympathy.
    'With Christian patience! And they need it. He fancies now that every man is plotting some harm against him. And says so, outright, besides any real and ancient wrongs he's kept in mind all too clearly.'
    They came into the big, bare room where the beds were laid, handy to the private chapel where the infirm might repair for the offices. Those who could rise to enjoy the brighter part of the day sat by a large log fire, warming their ancient bones and talking by fits and starts, as they waited for the next meal, the next office or the next diversion. Only Brother Rhys was confined to his bed, though most of those within here were aged, and spent much time there. A generation of brothers admitted in the splendid enthusiasm of an abbey's founding also comes to senility together, yielding place to the younger postulants admitted by ones and twos after the engendering wave. Never again, thought Cadfael, moving among them, would a whole chapter of the abbey's history remove thus into retirement and decay. From this time on they would come one by one, and be afforded each a death-bed reverently attended, single and in solitary dignity. Here were four or five who would depart almost together, leaving even their attendant brothers very weary, and the world indifferent.
    Brother Maurice sat installed by the fire, a tall, gaunt, waxen, white old man of elongated patrician face and irascible manner. He came of a noble house, an oblate since his youth, and had been removed here some two years previously, when after a trivial dispute he had suddenly called out Prior Robert in a duel to the death, and utterly refused to be distracted or reconciled. In his more placid moments he was gracious, accommodating and courteous, but touch him in his pride of family and honour and he was an implacable enemy. Here in his old age he called up from the past, vivid as when they happened, every affront to his line, every lawsuit waged against them, back to his own birth and beyond, and brooded over every one that had gone unrevenged.
    It was a mistake, perhaps, to ask him how he did, but his enthroned hauteur seemed to demand it. He raised his narrow hawk, nose, and tightened his bluish lips. 'None the better for what I hear, if it be true. They're saying that Gilbert Prestcote is alive and will soon be returning here. Is that truth?'
    'It is,' said Cadfael. 'Owain Gwynedd is sending him home in exchange for the Welshman captured in the Long Forest a while since. And why should you be none the better for good news of a decent Christian man?'
    'I had thought justice had been done,' said Maurice loftily, 'after all too long a time. But however long, divine justice should not fail in the end. Yet once again it has glanced aside and spared the malefactor.' The glitter of his eyes was grey as steel.
    'You'd best leave divine justice to its own business,' said Cadfael mildly, 'for it needs no help from us. And I asked you how you did, my friend, so never put me off with others. How is it with that chest of yours, this wintry weather? Shall I bring you a cordial to warm you?' It was no great labour to distract him, for though he was no complainer as to his health, he was open to the flattery of concerned attention and enjoyed being cosseted. They left him soothed and complacent, and went out to the porch very thoughtful.
    'I knew he had these hooks in him,' said Cadfael when the door was closed between, 'but not that he had such a barb from the Prestcote family. What is it he holds against the sheriff?'
    Edmund shrugged, and drew resigned breath. 'It was in his father's time, Maurice was scarcely born! There was a lawsuit over a piece of land and long arguments either side, and it went Prestcote's way. For all I know, as sound a