Brother Cadfael 15: The Confession of Brother Haluin

maidservant and two grooms in her train, and striking an elusive spark in Cadfael's memory. It could well be true. Or would such a seed have borne fruit so fast? The implication of haste was there. Cadfael saw again the two double-laden horses passing in the early morning, going steadily and with purpose. In haste to pay a half-forgotten debt of affection and remorse? Or to arrive before someone else, and be ready and armed to receive him? She wanted them satisfied and gone, but that was natural enough. They had trespassed on her peace, and held up an old, flawed mirror before her beautiful face.
    "Help me up!" said Haluin, and raised his arms like a child to be lifted to his feet; and that was the first time that he had asked for help, always before it had been proffered, and his acceptance humble and resigned rather than grateful.
    "You did not speak one word throughout," he said suddenly, marvelling, as they turned towards the church door.
    "I had not one word to speak," said Cadfael. "But I heard many words. And even the silences between them were not altogether inarticulate."
    Adelais de Clary's groom was waiting for them in the porch, as she had promised, leaning indolently with one shoulder propped against the jamb of the door, as though he had been waiting for some time, but with immovable patience. His appearance confirmed everything Brother Cadfael had elaborated, in his own mind, from the few glimpses he had had of the riders between the trees. The younger of the pair, this, a brawny young man of perhaps thirty years, thickset, bullnecked, unmistakably in the Norman mold. Perhaps the third or fourth generation from a progenitor who had come over as a man at arms with the first de Clary. The strong original stock still prevailed, though intermarriage with Englishwomen had tempered the fairness of his hair into a straw brown, and somewhat moderated the brutal bones of his face. He still wore his hair cropped into a close cap in the Norman manner, and his strong jaw clean-shaven, and he still had the bright, light, impenetrable eyes of the north. At their coming he sprang erect, more at ease in movement than in repose.
    "My lady sends me to show you the way."
    His voice was flat and clipped, and he waited for no reply, but set off out of the churchyard before them, at a pace Haluin could not well maintain. The groom looked back at the gate and waited, and thereafter abated his speed, though it obviously chafed him to move slowly. He said nothing of his own volition, and replied to question or simple civility cordially enough, but briefly. Yes, Elford was a very fine property, good land and a good lord. Audemar's competent management of his honour was acknowledged indifferently; this young man's allegiance was to Adelais rather than to her son. Yes, his father was in the same service, and so had his father been before him. About these monastic guests he showed no curiosity at all, though he might have felt some. Those pale grey alien eyes concealed all thought, or perhaps suggested thought's total absence.
    He brought them by a grassy way to the gate of the manor enclosure, which was walled and spacious. Audemar de Clary's house sat squarely in the midst, the living floor raised well above a stone undercroft, and to judge by the small windows above, there, were at least two more chambers over the solar. And his ample courtyard was built round with other habitable rooms, as well as the customary and necessary stables, armory, bakehouse and brewhouse, stores and workshops, and was populous with the activities of a large and busy household.
    The groom led them to a small timber lodging under the curtain wall.
    "My lady has had this chamber made ready for you. Use it as your own, she says, and the gateman will see to it you can come and go freely, to go to the church."
    Her hospitality, as they found, was meticulous but remote and impersonal. She had provided them with water for washing, comfortable pallets to rest on, sent them food from her own table, and given orders to tell them to ask for anything they might need or want that had been forgotten, but she did not receive them into her own presence. Perhaps forgiveness did not reach so far as to render Haluin's remorseful presence agreeable to her. Nor was it her house servants who waited on them, but the two grooms who had ridden with her from Hales. It was the elder of the two who brought them meat and bread and cheese, and small ale from the pantry. Cadfael