The Winter Mantle (37 page)

The hushed whispers of the pilgrims rose and echoed around the sturdy barrel vaulting of the roof. Geometrical designs were painted on the columns in colours so bright that they almost hurt the eye. Grass green, blood red, lapis blue, jewelled light from the stained glass window over the altar streamed down upon the pilgrims so that it seemed they were standing at the foot of a rainbow.

Simon's spurs scraped softly on the swept earth floor as he limped up the nave. A young monk was swinging a censer and the spicily scented smoke drifted on the air and settled its heavenly breath on garments, skin and hair.

Waltheof's tomb stood in the Chapter House, the carved wooden housing covered with a pall of dark-red silk bordered with gold embroidery that must have cost someone several marks. The sewing was in the Opus Anglicanum style and exquisitely worked. Above the tomb a ceramic oil lamp supported in brass chains sent out streamers of scented smoke.

Two older monks stood by the tomb, keeping a close watch on those who filed past and lifted the pall to kiss the dark wooden side. Simon supposed that a piece of the silk, surreptitiously cut away by a palmed knife, would fetch a high price from relic seekers. Among the flowers, the silver pennies, prayer beads and lighted candles placed as offerings around the base of the tomb were the sticks, crutches, bowls and cups of the sick who had been cured or improved by their pilgrimage.

The little girl laid her flowers among the other gifts, thus completing the image in Simon's memory. She dipped a curtsey, kissed the pall and with her mother was ushered on by another monk whose task it was to keep the file of pilgrims moving.

Simon knelt on his good leg, crossed himself and said a silent, private prayer over his clasped hands. A part of him half expected the pall to surge or the lamp to come crashing down on his head, but there was nothing, only the shuffle of the people waiting their turn and the soft jingle of the censer as the monk swung it back and forth, fumigating the crowd with its holy fragrance.

Perhaps Waitheof approved of what Simon had come to do. Comforting himself with that thought, he rose to his feet and followed the pilgrims out of a side entrance. His departure took him past another relic in the form of the skull of Abbot
Theodore, who had been martyred in a Danish raid two hundred years before. Stripped of flesh, the cranium bearing the mark of the killing blow, the sockets stared Simon out into the bright morning air where the current abbot was waiting for him, not Ulfcytel, as he had expected, but a taller, thinner monk with patrician features and a neatly clipped silver tonsure.

Once again Simon knelt. He kissed the ring of office on the Abbot's extended fingers. 'Father,' he murmured, managing to keep the note of surprise from his voice.

'I have sent your men to the guesthouse in the company of two brethren who will see to their needs,' the monk said pleasantly as Simon rose. 'I am Abbot Ingulf. Forgive me, it is not often that we see Normans at Crowland.'

Simon thanked him for the care of his men. 'My pilgrimage is a personal one,' he said, adding after a brief hesitation, 'Forgive me if this is a tactless question, but what has become of Abbot Ulfcytel?'

'You knew Ulfcytel?' The Abbot's brows rose towards his tonsure. Simon could see him struggling with the notion of a Norman courtier and soldier having such an acquaintance.

'Not well, but I met him on occasion and he seemed to me a good and holy man,'

'And so he was, God rest his soul.' Ingulf crossed himself and beckoned Simon to walk with him towards the low timber building that housed his private solar.

Simon signed his breast. 'I am sorry.'

'He is buried in Peterborough Abbey, where he finished his days as an ordinary monk.' Ingulf looked sidelong at Simon. 'Three years ago he was removed from the abbacy. His duties were becoming too onerous for his mind and body to perform.'

'It had nothing to do with the way he stood up to the King over Earl Waltheof?' Simon said neutrally.

The Abbot clasped his palms together. 'Yes, that too.' He gave a sorrowful shake of his head. 'Ulfcytel's mind took to wandering and he became outspoken - as a result of senility I believe, not out of any great desire to make mischief, but it was clear he was no longer fit for his duties. They sent him to Glastonbury, but I asked that he be permitted to return to Peterborough, which he knew and loved. He died there shortly after. We pray for his soul every day.'

Ingulf ushered Simon into his private solar and bade him be seated in a cushioned curule chair near an unlit brazier. Sunlight poured through the window arches and shone on the scattered bundles of floor rushes. 'I see that prayers are said daily for Earl Waltheof too,' Simon observed.

'Indeed,' Ingulfs expression was bland. 'He is in our care, and we honour our obligations.'

'Do you think he is at peace?'

Unsealing a leather costrel, Ingulf poured mead into two earthenware cups. 'As I understand, he was always at peace here,' he said gently. 'The difficulties began when he had to leave. Now he is home again - not in the manner that Ulfcytel would have chosen for him, but fitting in its own way.'

Simon took the cup that Ingulf handed to him and drank. The mead was dry and golden, with notes of autumnal crispness.

'And what of the Countess Judith?' Simon tried to make the question casual but saw from the sudden sharpening of the Abbot's gaze that he had failed.

'Despite her estrangement from the Earl in the months before his death, she has mourned him with great dignity and genuine… remorse,' Ingulf said.

Simon noted the use of 'remorse' not 'sorrow'. He had not seen Judith in more than ten years. What would she be like now? Although his expression remained unconcerned, his stomach churned.

'The Countess has given much time to the founding of her nunnery at Elstow,' Ingulf continued. 'God has become her solace. She and Waltheof may have had their differences, but they were united in their love of the Church. She has remained a chaste and dutiful widow.'

Simon almost grimaced but managed to lose the expression in his cup.

Ingulf studied him. 'Mayhap it is not my business to ask, but what brings a soldier of the Norman court to these parts? Surely not for the purpose of praying at the tomb of an English earl executed for treason?'

'Is it so obvious?' Simon asked wryly.

Ingulf gave a wintry smile and sipped fastidiously from his cup. 'Not until thought about,' he said. 'If we see Normans at Crowland it is either because they are travellers in need of a night's shelter or sheriff's men keeping an eye on our pilgrims.'

Simon inclined his head in acknowledgement. 'You are right, Father Abbot. Indeed, had I followed my purpose and no other consideration, I would not have come to Crowland at all. What brought me here today was honour and memory.' He hesitated and turned the cup in his hand, contemplating the decorative zigzag design.

Ingulf said nothing, but his silence was one of encouragement. Simon gnawed his underlip. Here in the Abbot's solar it was almost like a confessional and he found himself letting down his guard.

'I loved Waltheof,' he said. 'When I was a child, I thought of him as a heroic warrior. He saved my life and I worshipped him. Even when I grew out of the adoration, I cherished the image of the first time I saw him, striding out as if he owned the world with that red hair flowing and that cloak of his pinned at his shoulder with silver and gems. That is how I remember him. I have seen him with feet of clay many times, but those are not the occasions that hold my mind.'

Ingulf smiled and nodded gently. 'Ulfcytel told me that he always saw Waltheof as a young boy, learning his Psalter with the other lads in his care. He said that he saw the child standing at the side of the tomb, staring in bewilderment at what became of the man.'

'A vision you mean?'

The Abbot shrugged. 'So some would say, and I would not deny them.'

Silence fell again. Simon gently swirled the mead in his cup.

'You asked my purpose, Father. When I leave Crowland, my journey is to Northampton… to the dowager Countess,' he said. 'On the new king's command.'

'Ah,' Ingulf said, and the way he spoke told Simon that there was no need to say more; the Abbot understood perfectly. 'You will not necessarily find a welcome,' he warned. 'The Lady is strong-willed and accustomed to governing by her own hand. Nor has she made a pig's ear of the task. Harsh she may be, and not well loved as Earl Waltheof was, but she is fair. And she has the support of her family…'

'I have not been remiss in asking about such matters,' Simon said evenly.

'Then you will know what to face, my son.' The Abbot gave him a look that was almost pitying.

The last two words made Simon feel gauche and juvenile. For a seasoned courtier and battle commander it was ridiculous. He set his mead cup on the Abbot's trestle. 'I should be returning to my men,' he said abruptly, and rose to his feet. A pain, sharp and dull by turns, throbbed across his shin.

'Of course.' Ingulf saw him to the door and when he refused the services of a lay brother to show him the way to the guesthouse pointed him in the direction. 'You are always welcome here,' he said.

Thanking him, Simon joined the stream of pilgrims, easing his way through them until he came to the guesthouse situated near the porter's lodge. He sluiced his face and washed his hands in the laver provided. His men had made themselves beds along one wall with the straw palliasses provided. Listening to them joke as they assembled and sorted their gear, Simon briefly wished that he was one of their number, with nothing more pressing on his mind than obeying simple orders and looking forward to the next meal. And then he thought of the prize and realised that being one of their number had never been his destiny.

The tree was heavy with apples, green flushing with pink and gold as they ripened, and the size of a strong man's clenched fist. In the thirteen years since Matilda had planted the pip it had grown into a sturdy tree, kept compact and shapely by careful pruning and loving attention. Matilda had grown with it. She towered above Sybille and Helisende and had a good handspan advantage over her sister and mother. From the latter's barbed comments, it was clear to Matilda that her mother wished her daughter was a bush to which she could apply the pruning shears.

Stooping to the water jug at her feet, Matilda poured a silver libation around the base of the tree and murmured a blessing. The water elf still dwelt in his well, but now she was old enough to draw the lid herself. She always carried a quarter penny in her pouch to pay him. Her mother would have called the custom pagan and bid her cease, but what her mother did not know could not be a source of friction.

The garden belonged to Matilda. Ever since the planting of her first apple pip in small childhood, it had been her source of pleasure and refuge. She relished the feel of the crumbly dark loam in her hands. There was nothing more satisfying than setting seeds and watching them thrust their way into the light, in nurturing them and harvesting their fruit.

Her mother would take her to task for spending so much time among her plants, but she never sought to prevent her.