Brother Cadfael 15: The Confession of Brother Haluin

please, then. You were here afore," said the lad, narrowing his eyes curiously at this vaguely familiar visitor. "Only a few days back, with another black monk, one that went on crutches and very lame."
    "True," said Cadfael. "And I had speech with the lady then, and she will not have forgotten either me or that lame brother. If she refuses me a hearing now, I will let her be - but I think she will not refuse."
    "Try for yourself, then," agreed the groom indifferently. "She's still here with her maid, and I know she's within. She keeps within, these last days."
    "She had two grooms with her," said Cadfael, "father and son. We were acquainted, when we stayed here, they had come from Shropshire with her. I'd willingly pass the time of day with them, afterward, if they're not away to Vivers with the lord Audemar's people."
    "Oh, them! No, they're her fellows, none of his. But they're not here, neither. They went off yesterday on some errand of hers, very early. Where? How should I know where? Back to Hales, likely. That's where the old dame keeps, most of her time."
    I wonder, thought Cadfael, as he turned towards Adelais's dwelling in the corner of the enclave wall, and the groom led the cob away to the stable, truly I wonder how it would suit Adelais de Clary to know that her son's grooms speak of her as "the old dame." Doubtless to that raw boy she seemed ancient as the hills, but resolutely she cherished and conserved what had once been great beauty, and from that excellence nothing and no one must be allowed to detract. Not for nothing did she choose for her intimate maid someone plain and pockmarked, surrounding herself with dull and ordinary faces that caused her own lustre to glow more brightly.
    At the door of Adelais's hall he asked for audience, and the woman Gerta came out to him haughtily, protective of her mistress's privacy and assertive of her own office. He had sent in no name, and at sight of him she checked, none too pleased to see one of the Benedictines from Shrewsbury back again so soon, and so unaccountably.
    "My lady is not disposed to see visitors. What's your business, that you need trouble her with it? If you need lodging and food, my lord Audemar's steward will take care of it."
    "My business," said Cadfael, "is with the lady Adelais only, and concerns no one beside. Tell her that Brother Cadfael is here again, and that he comes from the abbey of Farewell, and asks to have some talk with her. That she shuns visitors I believe. But I think she will not refuse me."
    She was not so bold that she dared take it upon herself to deny him, though she went with a toss of her head and a disdainful glance, and would have been glad to bring back a dismissive answer. It was plain by the sour look on her face when she emerged from the solar that she was denied that pleasure.
    "My lady bids you in," she said coldly, and opened the door wide for him to pass by her and enter the chamber. And no doubt she hoped to linger and be privy to whatever passed, but favour did not extend so far.
    "Leave us," said the voice of Adelais de Clary, from deep shadow under a shuttered window. "And close the door between."
    She had no seemly woman's occupation for her hands this time, no pretence at embroidering or spinning, she merely sat in her great chair in semidarkness, motionless, her hands spread along the arms and gripping the carved lion heads in which they terminated. She did not move as Cadfael came in, she was neither surprised nor disturbed. Her deep eyes burned upon him without wonder and, he thought, without regret. It was almost as though she had been waiting for him.
    "Where have you left Haluin?" she asked.
    "At the abbey of Farewell," said Cadfael.
    She was silent for a moment, brooding upon him with a still face and glowing eyes, with an intensity he felt as a vibration upon the air, before ever his eyes had grown accustomed to the dim light, and watched her lineaments grow gradually out of darkness, the chosen darkness in which she had incarcerated herself. Then she said with harsh deliberation, "I shall never see him again."
    "No, you will never see him again. When this is done, we are going home."
    "But you," she said, "yes, I have had it in mind all this time that you would be back. Sooner or later, you would be back. As well, perhaps! Things have gone far beyond my reckoning now. Well, say what you have come to say. I would as lief be silent."
    "That you cannot do," said Cadfael. "It is your