Brother Cadfael 16: The Heretic's Apprentice

seen by others, at the town gate, on the bridge, here in the Foregate, or wherever he turned aside. We shall trace his every step, to fill in the time before he died."
    "But we cannot know when that was," said Radulfus.
    "No, true, no better than a guess. But Madog judges he was put into the river as soon as it grew dark, and that he'd lain hidden somewhere after his death, waiting for dark. Perhaps two or three hours, but there's no knowing. I have men out looking for any trace of where he may have lain hidden. If we find that, we find where he was murdered, for he could not have been moved far."
    "And all Lythwood's household are in one tale together-that the clerk, when he heard the young man made no claim to his place, started to come here, to confess his malice and withdraw the charge he had made?"
    "Further, the girl says that she had parted from Elave in the trees, there not far from the bridge, and told Aldwin so. She believes he went off in such haste in the hope of overtaking him. She says also," said Hugh with emphasis, "that she urged Elave to take to his heels, and he refused."
    "Then what he did accords with what he said," Radulfus allowed. "And his accuser set out to confess and beg pardon. Yes - it argues against," he said, holding Hugh eye-to-eye.
    "There are those who will argue for. And it must be said," Hugh owned fairly, "that circumstances give body to what they'll say. He was at liberty, he had good reason to bear a grudge. We know of no one else who had cause to strike at Aldwin. He set off to meet Elave, there in the trees. In cover. It hangs together, on the face of it, all too well, for the body must surely have gone into the water below the bridge, and cover is scant there along the Gaye."
    "All true," said Radulfus. "But equally true, I think, that if the young man had killed he would hardly have walked back into our precinct of his own will, as admittedly he did. Moreover, if the dead man was cast into the river after dark, that was not done by Elave. At least we know at what hour he returned here, it was just when the Vesper bell sounded. That does not prove past doubt that he did not kill, but it casts it into question. Well, we have him safe." He smiled, a little grimly. It was an ambiguous reassurance. A stone cell, securely locked, ensured Elave's personal safety no less than his close custody. "And now you wish to question him."
    "In your presence," said Hugh, "if you will." And catching the sharp, intelligent eye he said simply: "Better with a witness who cannot be suspect. You are as good a judge of a man as I am, and better."
    "Very well," said Radulfus. "He shall not come to us. We will go to him, while they are all in the frater. Robert is in attendance on Canon Gerbert." So he would be, thought Cadfael uncharitably. Robert was not the man to let slip the chance to ingratiate himself with a man of influence with the archbishop. For once his predilection for the powerful would be useful. "Anselm has been asking me to send the boy books to read," said the abbot. "He points out, rightly, that we have a duty to provide good counsel and exhortation, if we are to combat erroneous beliefs. Do you feel fitted, Cadfael, to undertake an advocacy on God's behalf?"
    "I am not sure," said Cadfael bluntly, thus brought up against the measure of his own concern and partisanship, "that the instructed would not be ahead of the instructor. I see my measure more in tending his broken head than in meddling with the sound mind inside it."
    Elave sat on his narrow pallet in one of the two stone penitential cells which were seldom occupied, and told what he had to tell, while Cadfael renewed the dressings on his gashes, and bandaged him afresh. He still looked somewhat the worse for wear, bruised and stiff from the attentions of Gerbert's overzealous grooms, but by no means subdued. At first, indeed, he was inclined to be belligerent, on the assumption that all these officials, religious and secular alike, must be hostile, and predisposed to find fault in every word he said. It was an attitude which did not consort well with his customary openness and amiability, and Cadfael was sorry to see him thus maimed, even for a brief time. But it seemed that he did not find in his visitors quite the animosity and menace he had expected, for in a little while his closed and wary face eased and warmed, and the chill edge melted from his voice.
    "I gave my word I would not quit this place," he said firmly,