Brother Cadfael 17: The Potter's Field by Ellis Peters Read Free Book Online Page A

'So I've heard,' said Eudo serenely. 'My man Robin saw them come. I'll be glad to see it productive, though it's no business of mine now.'

'We're none of us overjoyed at the first crop it's produced,' said Hugh bluntly. "The plough has turned up a body from under the headland. We have a dead woman in the mortuary chapel at the abbey - or her bones, at least.'

The young man had halted in the act of pouring wine for his visitor, so abruptly that the pitcher shook and spilled red over his hand. He turned upon Hugh round, blue, astonished eyes, and stared open-mouthed.

'A dead woman? What, buried there? Bones, you say - how long dead then? And who can it be?'

'Who's to know that? Bones is all we have, but a woman it is. Or was once. Dead perhaps as long as five years, so I'm advised, but no longer, and perhaps much less. Have you ever seen strangers there, or anything happening to make a man take notice? I know you had no need to keep a watch on the place, it has been Haughmond's business for the past year, but since it's so close, some of your men may have noted if there were intruders about. You've no inkling of anything untoward?'

Eudo shook his head vehemently. 'I haven't been up there since my father, God rest him, gave the field to the priory. They tell me there have been vagabonds lying up there in the cottage now and then, during the fair or overnight last winter if they were travelling, but who or what I don't know. There was no harm ever reported or threatened, that I know of. This comes very strangely to me.'

'To all of us,' Hugh agreed ruefully, and took the offered cup. It was growing dim in the hall, and there was a fire already laid. Outside the open door the light showed faintly blue with mist, shot through with the faded gold of sunset. 'You never heard of any woman going astray from her home in these parts, these last few years?'

'No, none. My people live all around, they would have known, and it would have come to my ears soon enough. Or to my father's, in his time. He had a good hold on everything that went on here, they brought everything to him, knowing he would not willingly let any man of his miscarry.'

'I know that for truth,' said Hugh heartily. 'But you'll not have forgotten, there was one woman who walked out of her house and went away without a word. And from that very croft.'

Eudo was staring at him again in open disbelief, great-eyed, even breaking into a broad grim at the very idea.

'Ruald's woman? You can't mean it! Everyone knew about her going, that was no secret. And do you truly mean it could be so recent? But even if it could, and this poor wench bones already, that's folly! Generys took herself off with another man, and small blame to her, when she found that if he was free to follow his bent, she was still bound. We would have seen to it that she would not want, but that was not enough for her. Widows can wed again, but she was no widow. You can't surely believe, in good earnest, that this is Generys you have in the mortuary?'

'I am at a total loss,' Hugh admitted. 'But the place and the time and the way they tore themselves apart must make a man wonder. As yet there are but the few of us know of this, but in a little while it must out, and then you'll hear what every tongue will be whispering. Better if you should make enquiry among your own men for me, see if any of them has noted furtive things going on about that field, or doubtful fellows lurking in the cottage. Especially if any had women with them. If we can find some way of putting a name to the woman we shall be a long stride on the way.'

It seemed that Eudo had come to terms with the reality of death by this time, and was taking it seriously, though not as a factor which could or should be allowed to disturb the tenor of his own ordered existence. He sat thoughtfully gazing at Hugh over the wine