Brother Cadfael 17: The Potter's Field

Not that Britric is small in any other way, mind you. A big lusty fellow, red-haired, a bit of a brawler sometimes, when he's drunk, but not a bad lad, take him all in all.'

    

'Last year,' said Hugh, 'he had a woman with him, or so I hear. I've good cause to know he was not lodging with you then, but if he did his drinking here you must have seen something of them both. You remember her?'

    

Wat was certainly remembering her already, with some pleasure and a great deal of amusement. 'Oh, her! Hard to forget, once seen. She could twist herself like a slip of willow, dance like a March lamb, and play on the little pipe. Easy to carry, better than a rebec unless you're a master. And she was the practical one, keeping a tight hold on the money they made between them. She talked of marriage, but I doubt she'd ever get him to the church door. Maybe she talked of it once too often, for he came alone this year round. Where he's left her there's no knowing, but she'll make her way wherever she is.'

    

That had a very bitter ring in Hugh's ear, considering the possibility he had in mind. Wat, it seemed, had not made the connection which had already influenced the widow's thinking. But before he could ask anything further Wat surprised him by adding simply: 'Gunnild, he called her. I never knew where she came from - I doubt if he knew it, either - but she's a beauty.'

    

That, too, had its strange resonance, when Hugh recalled the naked bones. More and more, in imagination, they took on the living aspect of this wild, sinuous, hardworking waif of the roads, darkly brilliant as the admiring gleam she could kindle in a middle-aged innkeeper's eyes after a year and more of absence.

    

'You have not seen her since, here or elsewhere?'

    

'How often am I elsewhere?' Wat responded good-humouredly. 'I did my roaming early. I'm content where I am. No, I've never set eyes on the girl again. Nor heard him so much as mention her name this year, now I come to think of it. For all the thought he seemed to be giving to last year's fancy,' said Wat tolerantly, 'she might as well be dead.'

    

'So there we have it,' said Hugh, summing up briskly for Cadfael in the snug privacy of the workshop in the herb garden. 'Britric is the one man we know to have made himself at home there in Ruald's croft. There may have been others, but none that we can learn of. Moreover, there was a woman with him, and their mating by ail accounts tempestuous, she urging marriage on him, and he none too ready to be persuaded. More than a year ago, this. And this year not only does he come to the fair alone, but she is not seen there at all, she who gets her living at fairs and markets and weddings and such jollifications. It is not proof, but it requires answers.'

    

'And she has a name,' said Cadfael reflectively. 'Gunnild. But not a habitation. She comes from nowhere and is gone, nowhere. Well, you cannot but look diligently for them both, but he should be the easier to find. And as I guess, you already have all your people alerted to look out for him.'

    

'Both round the shire and over the border,' said Hugh flatly. 'His rounds, they say, go no further, apart from journeys to the towns to buy such commodities as salt and spices.'

    

'And here are we into November, and the season for markets and fairs over, but the weather still fairly mild and dry. He'll be still on his travels among the villages, but I would guess,' said Cadfael, pondering, 'not too far afield. If he still has a base in Ruiton, come the hard frosts and snow he'll be making for it, and he'll want to be within a reasonable few miles of it when the pinch comes.'

    

'About this time of year,' said Hugh, 'he remembers he has a mother in Ruiton, and makes his way back there for the winter.'

    

'And you have someone waiting there for his coming.'

    

'If luck serves,' said Hugh, 'we may pick him up before then. I know Ruiton, it lies barely eight miles from Shrewsbury. He'll time his journeys to bring round by all those Welsh villages and bear east through Knockin, straight for home. There are many hamlets close-set in that corner, he can go on with his selling until the weather changes, and still be near to home. Somewhere there we shall find him.'

    

Somewhere there, indeed, they found him, only three days later. One of Hugh's sergeants had located the pedlar at work among the villages on the Welsh side of the border, and discreetly