still lived, then he came home and took it. Her possessions no one has ever worn or touched, otherwise. Simply, they are in safe keeping. I will readily deliver them up to you, or to anyone who has a claim. Until last night I had not opened the box since first it was laid there. I did not know what he had done. Neither did Eudo. He knows nothing about this. Nor never shall.'

    

From his preferred corner, where he could observe without involvement, Cadfael spoke for the first time. 'I think, also, you may not yet know all you would wish to know about your son Sulien. Look back to the time when Ruald entered this house, abandoning his wife. How much did you know of what went on in Sulien's mind then? Did you know how deeply he was affected to Generys? A first love, the most desperate always. Did you know that in her desolation she gave him cause for a time to think there might be a cure for his? When in truth there was none?'

    

She had turned her head and fixed her gaunt dark eyes earnestly on Cadfael's face. And steadily she said: 'No, I did not know it. I knew he frequented their croft. So he had from a small child, they were fond of him. But if there was so extreme a change, no, he never said word or gave sign. He was a secret child, Sulien. Whatever ailed Eudo I always knew, he is open as the day. Not Sulien!'

    

'He has told us that it was so. And did you know that because of this attachment he still went there, even when she had thought fit to put an end to his illusion? And that he was there in the dark,' said Cadfael with rueful gentleness, 'when Generys was buried?'

    

'No,' she said, 'I did not know. Only now had I begun to fear it. That or some other knowledge no less dreadful to him.'

    

'Dreadful enough to account for much. For why he made up his mind to take the cowl, and not here in Shrewsbury, but far away in Ramsey. What did you make of that, then?' asked Hugh.

    

'It was not so strange in him,' she said, looking into distance and faintly and ruefully smiling. 'That was something that could well happen to Sulien, he ran deep, and thought much. And then, there was a bitterness and a pain in the house, and I know he could not choose but feel it and be troubled. I think I was not sorry that he should escape from it and go free, even if it must be into the cloister. I knew of no worse reason. That he had been there, and seen - no, that I did not know.'

    

'And what he saw,' said Hugh, after a brief and heavy silence, 'was his father, burying the body of Generys.'

    

'Yes,' she said. 'It must have been so.'

    

'We could find no other possibility,' said Hugh, 'and I am sorry to have to set it before you. Though I still cannot see what reason there could be, why or how it came about that he killed her.'

    

'Oh, no!' said Donata. 'No, not that. He buried her, yes. But he did not kill her. Why should he? I see that Sulien believed it, and would not at any cost have it known to the world. But it was not like that.'

    

'Then who did?' demanded Hugh, confounded. 'Who was her murderer?'

    

'No one,' said Donata. 'There was no murder.'

    

Chapter Fourteen

    

Of the unbelieving silence that followed, Hugh's voice asked: 'If this was not murder, why the secret burial, why conceal a death for which there could be no blame?'

    

'I have not said,' Donata said patiently, 'that there was no blame. I have not said that there was no sin. It is not for me to judge. But murder there was none. I am here to tell you truth. The judgement must be yours.'

    

She spoke as one, and the only one, who could shed light on all that had happened, and the only one who had been kept in ignorance of the need. Her voice remained considerate, authoritative and kind. Very simply and clearly she set out her case, excusing nothing, regretting nothing.

    

'When Ruald turned away from his wife, she was desolated and despairing. You will not have forgotten, Father, for you must have been in grave doubt concerning his decision. She, when she found she could not hold him, came to appeal to my husband, as overlord and friend to them both, to reason with Ruald and try to persuade him he did terrible wrong. And truly I think he did his best for her, and again and again went to argue her case, and tried also, surely, to comfort and reassure her, that she should not suffer loss of house and living by reason of Ruald's desertion. My lord was good to his people. But Ruald