Brother Cadfael 14: The Hermit of Eyton Forest

what to do with her! And the devil of it is, neither will Stephen, if ever it comes to that. He could have kept her tight shut into Arundel the day she landed, if he'd had the sense. And what did he do? Gave her an escort, and sent her off to Bristol to join her brother! But if the queen ever gets the lady into her power, that will be another story. If he's a grand fighter, she's the better general, and knows how to hold on to her advantages.'
    Hugh rose and stretched, and a rising breeze from the open door ruffled his smooth black hair, and rustled the dangling bunches of dried herbs hanging from the roof beams. 'Well, there's no hurrying the siege to an end, we must wait and see. I hear they've finally given you a lad to help you in the herb garden, is it true? I noticed your hedge has had a second clipping, was that his work?'
    'It was.' Cadfael went out with him along the gravel path between the patterned beds of herbs, grown a little wiry at this end of the growing season. The box hedge at one side had indeed been neatly trimmed of the straggling shoots that come late in the summer. 'Brother Winfrid - you'll see him busy in the patch where we've cleared the bean vines, digging in the holms. A big, gangling lad all elbows and knees. Not long out of his novitiate. Willing, but slow. But he'll do. They sent him to me, I fancy, because he turned out fumble-fisted with either pen or brush, but give him a spade, and that's more his measure. He'll do!'
    Outside the walled herb garden the vegetable plots extended, and beyond the slight rise on their right the harvested pease fields ran down to the Meole Brook, which was the rear border of the abby enclave. And there was Brother Winfrid in full vigorous action, a big, loose-jointed youth with a shock-head of wiry hair hedging in his shaven crown, his habit kilted to brawny knees, and a broad foot shod in a wooden clog driving the steel-edged spade through the fibrous tangle of bean holms as through blades of grass. He gave them one beaming glance as they passed, and returned to his work without breaking the rhythm. Hugh had one glimpse of a weather-browned country face and round, guileless blue eyes.
    'Yes, I should think he might do very well,' he said, impressed and amused, 'whether with a spade or a battle-axe. I could do with a dozen such at the castle whenever they care to offer their services.'
    'He'd be no use to you,' said Cadfael with certainty. 'Like most big men, the gentlest soul breathing. He'd throw his sword away to pick up the man he'd flattened. It's the little, shrill terriers that bare their teeth.'
    They emerged into the band of flowerbeds beyond the kitchen garden, where the rose bushes had grown leggy and begun to shed their leaves. Rounding the corner of the box hedge, they came out into the great court, at this working hour of the morning almost deserted but for one or two travellers coming and going about the guest hall, and a stir of movement down in the stables. Just as they rounded the tall hedge to step into the court, a small figure shot out of the gate of the grange court, where the barns and storage lofts lined three sides of a compact yard, and made off at a run across the narrows of the court into the cloister, to emerge a minute later at the other end at a decorous walk, with eyes lowered in seemly fashion, and plump, childish hands devoutly linked at his belt, the image of innocence. Cadfael halted considerately, with a hand on Hugh's arm, to avoid confronting the boy too obviously.
    The child reached the corner of the infirmary, rounded it, and vanished. There was a distinct impression that as he quit the sight of any watchers in the great court he broke into a run again, for a bare heel flashed suddenly and was gone. Hugh was grinning. Cadfael caught his friend's eye, and said nothing.
    'Let me hazard!' said Hugh, twinkling. 'You picked your apples yesterday, and they're not yet laid up in the trays in the loft. Lucky it was not Prior Robert who saw him at it, and he with the breast of his cotte bulging like a portly dame!'
    'Oh, there are some of us have a sort of silent understanding. He'll have taken the biggest, but only four. He thieves in moderation. Partly from decent obligation, partly because half the sport is to tempt providence again and again.'
    Hugh's agile black eyebrow signalled amused enquiry. 'Why four?'
    'Because we have but four boys still in school, and if he thieves at all, he thieves for all. There are several