The Pilgram of Hate by Ellis Peters Read Free Book Online Page A

surely taller and broader than need, her hips bolstered by
petticoats, the aura of bustle and command she bore about with her equally
generous and ebullient. He felt a wave of warmth go out to her for her energy
and vigour, while he spared a morsel of sympathy for the chicks she mothered,
stowed thus away beneath such ample, smothering wings.
    In
the afternoon, busy about his small kingdom and putting together the
medicaments he must take along the Foregate to Saint Giles in the morning, to
be sure they had provision enough over the feast, he was not thinking of her,
nor of any of the inhabitants of the guest-hall, since none had as yet had
occasion to call for his aid. He was packing lozenges into a small box,
soothing tablets for scoured, dry throats, when a bulky shadow blocked the open
door of his workshop, and a brisk, light voice said, “Pray your pardon,
brother, but Brother Denis advised me to come to you, and sent me here.”
    And
there she stood, filling the doorway, shoulders squared, hands folded at her
waist, head braced and face full forward. Her eyes, wide and wide-set, were
bright blue but meagrely supplied with pale lashes, yet very firm and fixed in
their regard.
    “It’s
my young nephew, you see, brother,” she went on confidently, “my sister’s son,
that was fool enough to go off and marry a roving Welshman from Builth, and now
her man’s gone, and so is she, poor lass, and left her two children orphan, and
nobody to care for them but me. And me with my own husband dead, and all his
craft fallen to me to manage, and never a chick of my own to be my comfort. Not
but what I can do very well with the work and the journeymen, for I’ve learned
these twenty years what was what in the weaving trade, but still I could have
done with a son of my own. But it was not to be, and a sister’s son is dearly
welcome, so he is, whether he has his health or no, for he’s the dearest lad
ever you saw. And it’s the pain, you see, brother. I don’t like to see him in
pain, though he doesn’t complain. So I’m come to you.”
    Cadfael
made haste to wedge a toe into this first chink in her volubility, and insert a
few words of his own into the gap.
    “Come
within, mistress, and welcome. Tell me what’s the nature of your lad’s pain,
and what I can do for you and him I’ll do. But best I should see him and speak
with him, for he best knows where he hurts. Sit down and be easy, and tell me
about him.”
    She
came in confidently enough, and settled herself with a determined spreading of
ample skirts on the bench against the wall. Her gaze went round the laden
shelves, the stored herbs dangling, the brazier and the pots and flasks,
interested and curious, but in no way awed by Cadfael or his mysteries.
    “I’m
from the cloth country down by Campden, brother, Weaver by name and by trade
was my man, and his father and grandfather before him, and Alice Weaver is my
name, and I keep up the work just as he did. But this young sister of mine, she
went off with a Welshman, and the pair of them are dead now, and the children I
sent for to live with me. The girl is eighteen years old now, a good,
hard-working maid, and I daresay we shall contrive to find a decent match for
her in the end, though I shall miss her help, for she’s grown very handy, and
is strong and healthy, not like the lad. Named for some outlandish Welsh saint,
she is, Melangell, if ever you heard the like!”
    “I’m
Welsh myself,” said Cadfael cheerfully. “Our Welsh names do come hard on your
English tongues, I know.”
    “Ah
well, the boy brought a name with him that’s short and simple enough. Rhun,
they named him. Sixteen he is now, two years younger than his sister, but wants
her heartiness, poor soul. He’s well-grown enough, and very comely, but from a
child something went wrong with his right leg, it’s twisted and feebled so he
can put but the very toe of it to the ground at