A Dark Night Hidden (32 page)

Gently and with the respect due to a recent dramatic bereavement, Josse and de Gifford persuaded the group to mount up again. Then, in silence, they rode away from their fallen companion and headed on down to the sea.

They found a ship bound for Harfleur whose master was prepared to take five passengers in exchange for the Lord of the High Weald’s bag of gold. Arnulf, who had recovered his air of leadership somewhat following the shock of Benedetto’s death, said that Harfleur would serve them well. They would be able to journey down through Normandy and Aquitaine, cross the Loire and the Dordogne and from thence journey on to Albi.

‘That is your destination?’ Josse asked.

Arnulf gave a pale smile. ‘It is where we are gathering,’ he replied. ‘Aurelia and Guiscard have friends and family there; it is their home.’

‘What of your home, Arnulf?’ Josse regarded him with sympathy. ‘Yours, Alexius’s and Utta’s?’

Arnulf gave a small sigh. ‘I do not believe that any of us will see our home again,’ he said. ‘But we shall make a new home,’ he said, brightening with an obvious effort. ‘Our own people are our family now and we shall all band together, all Cathars from every land. We shall gather in the Languedoc and be left in peace.’

Josse, who very much doubted it, said nothing. Instead he took Arnulf’s hands in his and simply wished him good luck.

Then, as Arnulf turned to take his farewell of Morcar and de Gifford, Josse walked across to where the rest of the group stood, waiting for Arnulf to lead them on board.

Putting careful hands on to Aurelia’s narrow shoulders, he wished her safe passage and a good journey. With a soft smile, she gently pulled his face down to hers and gave him a soft kiss like the touch of a butterfly. ‘Thank you,’ she whispered.

Utta then kissed him too, with rather more passion. Staring up into his eyes, she appeared to be about to say something. But, shaking her head with a smile, she kept her silence. Later, boarding the ship, she turned and gave him a small last wave.

He said a prayer for her. For them all. Then he turned and, following behind de Gifford and Morcar, left the quay.

Morcar turned for home as soon as the Cathars had been despatched; he seemed to be as fresh as when they had set out that morning and apparently had no fear of a twenty-mile journey in the gathering dark. Before he left, he solemnly took his leave of Josse, clasping Josse’s right hand in his own and twisting it so that their forearms wound around each other.

‘My father thinks well of you, Josse d’Acquin, and so do I,’ he said. ‘You are ever a welcome guest at Saxonbury.’ Then, with a nod to de Gifford, he mounted up and, leading the horses that his father had supplied for the Cathars, rode away.

De Gifford watched him go. Then, slapping Josse’s shoulder, he said, ‘I don’t know about you, Josse, but I’m cold, tired and my spirits are low. I suggest that we find the best tavern that this port has to offer and order ourselves the finest meal in the house and a large flagon of ale.’

Josse, who was struggling with emotions that ran too deep for easy comprehension, thought that was the best idea he had heard in quite some time.

The little port was quiet but a light shone out from a low-slung building outside which hung some branches from a fir tree. As Josse and de Gifford approached, they heard voices and laughter; pushing the tavern door open, they were greeted with warmth, firelight and what seemed to be a cheerful, though small, company.

De Gifford glanced at Josse. ‘I think that this is the best we’re going to get,’ he remarked.

‘It’ll do for me,’ Josse replied. ‘Lead on.’

Josse and de Gifford returned to Hawkenlye in the morning.

When they came to the spot in the Cuckmere Valley where Benedetto had died, they stopped to locate and bury his body.

There was no sign of him.

They searched the area and, after a while, de Gifford called out. ‘Over here. There is a patch of newly turned ground.’

Josse went over to where he was standing. Half under a hedge, where the soil was broken up by the roots of shrubs and grasses, there was a long area of exposed earth. It would be hidden when the hedgerow bloomed in spring but, for now, it was quite clear what it was. At one end, a strangely shaped cross made of twigs had been stuck in the soil.

De Gifford said, ‘Morcar must have done it. Last night, under cover of darkness; very wise of him. He is stronger even than he looks; it can have been no easy task to dig a grave for a big man when the ground is so hard.’

But Josse was hardly listening. The cross had reminded him of something.

Reaching inside his tunic, he took out the Cathar manuscript. ‘I should have given them this,’ he said regretfully. ‘It must be priceless and they will surely miss their treasure.’

De Gifford was frowning. ‘I am not so sure, Josse. Whoever left it at Hawkenlye did so for a reason. They wanted to hide it, I would guess, in a place where it stood a chance of being safe.’

‘But anyone in the Abbey who found it would take it to the Abbess Helewise and it would be destroyed! Even Benedetto must have known that!’

‘I do not think that it was Benedetto who hid the manuscript,’ de Gifford said thoughtfully. ‘I believe it was Arnulf. As the leader of the group, he would have had the charge of their precious document and it would have been his responsibility to decide what was done with it when they realised that they could not risk keeping it with them. I think he must have slipped inside the script room while Benedetto was carrying Aurelia into the infirmary. It would have made a good diversion, wouldn’t it? Every pair of eyes agog with the big man and the wounded woman?’

‘Aye,’ Josse acknowledged.

‘And as to the manuscript being destroyed if it were to be found, you have in your hand the proof that it was not so. That Arnulf judged right when he chose his hiding place.’

Slowly Josse turned the brilliantly coloured pages. There was that strange cross again.

De Gifford said, ‘What will you do with it?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Will you put it back in the book cupboard?’

‘No. It has escaped from Hawkenlye once and I will not chance its fortune there again.’

‘Very wise,’ de Gifford murmured.

‘I ought not to keep it,’ Josse mused.

‘You fear for your skin if it is found on you or on your property?’

‘No, it isn’t that. It’s just that it is so clearly valuable and I have no right to it.’

‘It has come to you, though,’ de Gifford pointed out. He hesitated, then said, ‘Would you like to know what I think you should do?’

Josse gave him a grin. ‘Aye, I’d be delighted.’

‘Put it away in a very good hiding place,’ the sheriff said. ‘Tell nobody where it is, not even me.’

‘But why not you?’

‘Try to forget about it,’ de Gifford urged, as if he had not heard Josse’s question. ‘One day it will be even more valuable than it is today, for it will be unique. One day, who knows, maybe somebody will come asking for it. You may give it to them, you may not.’ His green eyes met Josse’s. ‘You will know what to do.’

Before Josse could ask him to explain, he had turned away. He stood with bowed head over Benedetto’s grave for a few moments, then mounted up and led the way off across the valley.

When they were approaching Hawkenlye Abbey, de Gifford drew rein. ‘This is where we part company,’ he said. ‘I am heading home and I imagine that you are bound for the Abbey.’

‘Aye.’ And the Abbess too, Josse thought. He had not yet decided how he would approach her, how much of the recent happenings he was going to reveal to her. It troubled him to think of lying to her and his heart was heavy.

De Gifford was studying him. ‘I think,’ he said, ‘that you should follow your instincts.’

‘But my instinct is to tell her everything!’

De Gifford smiled. ‘Exactly.’

Returning his smile, Josse said, ‘I have enjoyed our encounter, Gervase. There are many things about you that puzzle me, but I do know that I trust you.’

‘I am glad of it,’ de Gifford replied. Then he added carefully, as if he were reluctant to ask and did so despite himself, ‘What things puzzle you?’

‘Your defence of the heretics, for one. Aye,’ – he overrode de Gifford as the sheriff made to speak – ‘I recall what you said about there being more than one way to find the truth. Nevertheless, it still surprises me that a man of the law should go so far in his defence of a bunch of heretics.’

‘A bunch of heretics,’ de Gifford echoed softly. ‘Yes, Josse, but as I knew even before I met them, they are not just any heretics. They are Cathars.’

‘Does that make any difference?’

‘Yes.’ The light green eyes held an emotion that Josse could not immediately read. ‘I have family in the Midi, Josse. For all that she married a knight from the north and made her home here in England, my mother never forgot the land of her birth. When my father died, she went back to the Languedoc. She became a
parfaite
three years ago.’

‘Your mother is a Cathar?’

De Gifford nodded. ‘Yes. A well known and, so I believe, well loved one. Aurelia and Guiscard know her well and brought her greetings to me.’ He lowered his head. ‘Of course, she wishes that I would join her – join her faith, too – but she respects my decision not to.’ He sighed. ‘She is – all of them are – a very great deal more tolerant than their Christian brethren, don’t you think?’

Now he had raised his head again and Josse could read the emotion that had him in its grip.

It was love.

The two men parted at the Abbey gates. De Gifford said, ‘Remember what I said.’

And Josse, thinking back swiftly and isolating the one comment to which de Gifford must be referring, nodded.

‘We shall meet again, Josse,’ de Gifford said. ‘I do not forget that you saved my skin. Sooner or later, I shall find a way to repay you.’

Then, with a wave of his arm, he spurred his horse and cantered off down the road.

Helewise had been expecting Josse for many hours. She had tried to calculate how long his journey would take but had quickly given up; she had no idea how fast they would be able to travel, nor even how soon they would have set out.

She had known where he was going. She had known, too, that he would quietly remove Aurelia from the infirmary as soon as she could tolerate being moved. And she had finally made up her mind what she should do.

It had cost her dear.

She had knelt at the altar for most of the night before Josse came for Aurelia. She had gone into a sort of trance, probably brought on by distress, fatigue and hunger; she had been fasting, offering the discomfort and the hunger pangs to God in return for his guidance. The two options, to denounce Aurelia or to let her go, had warred inside her head like fierce rival armies, first the one getting the upper hand and then the other. Obedience to her nun’s vow, indeed, to her Christian faith, told her she must find a priest – any priest – and tell him that Hawkenlye Abbey was harbouring a Cathar. But her heart had its share of Christ’s greatest gift, that of compassion, and, no matter how hard she tried, she could not make herself believe that the Saviour whom she loved wanted her to deliver another of his daughters to the pain of imprisonment and an agonising death.

In the end she had seen – thought she had seen – the tender face of Christ. And in the small hours she had risen to her feet knowing what to do.

It was on Helewise’s own orders that no nun had sat quietly on duty in the pre-dawn silence of the infirmary that morning. On her orders too that the bolts on the Abbey gates were oiled to make sure that they slid back easily and soundlessly.

Later that day, when Josse and Aurelia were long gone and Gervase de Gifford had come looking for them, something deep within her had told her that he, too, was a friend to the group. That, like Helewise, he was deliberately putting aside the duty he owed to his office and following his heart. That he was helping the Cathars to escape.

She did not know why he was doing so. She was only glad, as she saw him on his way, that he was on their side.

Sister Caliste, quietly and efficiently going about her duties, had a new patient in the bed that had been Aurelia’s. An elderly man had gone down with a racking cough that tore at and pained his lungs, and Caliste was dosing him with Sister Tiphaine’s strongest remedy. She had also put a bowl of hot water beside his bed into which she had cast a bundle of special herbs. The steam that rose from the water was fragrant and soothing; already the old man’s cough was easing.

Sitting beside him, wafting the steam towards his sleeping form, Caliste asked herself yet again whether she had done right or whether she had disobeyed and must confess and do penance. Her actions had helped someone reach safety, which must be good. But on the other hand she might well have gone against ecclesiastical rules in so doing . . .

Sister Tiphaine had explained what she must do. There was a sanctuary waiting for the Cathar woman, she said, and someone would come for her when she was ready to go. Sister Tiphaine had found the opportunity to have a quiet and unobserved moment with Aurelia, who consequently knew what was being arranged for her. Sister Caliste had but to inform Sister Tiphaine when Aurelia was ready and Sister Tiphaine would get word to the friends who awaited her. So Caliste had watched carefully, spoken to Aurelia, done all that she could to bring about the woman’s recovery and to restore her to strength. And then, when the moment was right – a little before, actually, but Sister Tiphaine had urged haste and told Caliste that they must act as soon as was at all possible – Sister Caliste had sought out Sister Tiphaine and told her that Aurelia was ready.

It had been dark in the herbalist’s little hut, and there had been a strong smell from something that she was brewing up in her cauldron. Caliste had delivered her message and then, with relief, turned to go. Sister Tiphaine, with a short bark of laughter as if she read Caliste’s mind, had said, ‘You’ve done well, lass. Now leave it to me. I have my own ways of getting a message out to those who dwell in the world, but you’ll forgive me if I don’t share them with you. But don’t worry. I’ve been keeping Aurelia’s friends aware of all that’s happened here. I’ll make sure they’re expecting her.’