Heart of Ice (41 page)

     Then she got to her feet and, trying to straighten her back and walk like the woman of her people that she was, she pushed the curtain aside and walked out into the ward. The big nun stepped forward, her terrible anxiety evident in the very way she stood, straining forward, and the pain in her eyes shot out to Joanna as if she had loosed an arrow into her heart.

     ‘She is a little better,’ Joanna whispered. The pounding in her head was growing to a cacophony of agony. Gasping as she tried to control it, she reached into her leather satchel and extracted a small flask. It contained water in which Meggie had held the Eye; the jewel had had a longer contact with this particular water and Joanna hoped that it was correspondingly more potent. ‘Give her some of this as soon as she is able to swallow,’ she told the big nun. ‘I think – I am sure – it will help.’

     The nun was watching her with the professional eyes of another healer and Joanna knew she could read the pain. ‘You poor soul,’ the nun said gently. ‘Would you like to lie down awhile, dear? You look exhausted.’

     Joanna managed a smile. ‘No, I would rather return to my own place.’

     ‘Want me to find someone to go with you and see you safely home?’

     It was a kind offer but one that Joanna knew she must instantly reject, for the most likely candidate for the task was Josse and she really could not cope with Josse right now. ‘I shall be perfectly all right alone. Thank you,’ she added.

     The nun caught her sleeve. ‘Will you come back and see how she does?’

     Joanna tried to think what it would mean if she said yes but the pain and the deadly fatigue were interfering with her mind. She said yes anyway.

     The big nun still had not finished with her. ‘There’s another patient just been brought in,’ she said quietly, nodding to a cot quite close to the curtained recess where the Abbess lay. ‘He’s near death and—’

     ‘I’m very sorry but I can’t do any more now,’ Joanna whispered.

     ‘I was not going to ask you to!’ the nun said. ‘Dear child, you’ve done more than enough already.’ Dear child. The sweet words touched Joanna’s heart. ‘I was just going to ask,’ the nun was saying, ‘whether we could spare him some drops of this.’ She held up the flask that Joanna had just given her.

     ‘Of course. Give it to him with my blessing.’ Even to herself, Joanna’s voice was sounding distant. If I remain here any longer, she thought, I’ll lose my last chance of getting back to the hut before I collapse.

     With what she hoped was a dignified bow to the nun, she straightened her back, lifted her chin, strode out of the long ward and set off on the path that would take her home.

Chapter 21

Josse watched Joanna climb the path that led up to the Abbey. Her dark figure moved fast as, leaving the track, she strode off around the outside of the Abbey walls and disappeared from sight. Following her in his mind’s eye, he saw her hurry across the open ground and, finally reaching the safety of the trees, melt into the shadows of the Great Forest.

     He was not sure whether or not she had noticed him standing there outside the Vale infirmary door as she hurried past. She had been staring straight in front of her, eyes narrowed as if fixed on some difficult goal that she might or might not achieve. He had so much wanted to reach out to her but there had been something about her – almost as if she wore invisible armour – that had stopped him.

     So he had let her go.

     Firmly putting her out of his mind, he turned and stepped inside the ward. Sister Euphemia was already hurrying towards him; she held a small flask in her hand and she was smiling.

     ‘You already know, don’t you?’ she said softly, taking him by the arm and leading him back outside again, where they sat down side by side on his bench.

     Josse smiled. ‘Aye. I felt – oh, I don’t know.’ He scratched his head vigorously as if it might stir up his brains. ‘I had all but given up and then suddenly I had this picture of her with light on her face and she looked so happy, so beautiful—’ He broke off, not sure if he trusted his voice enough to continue.

     ‘Our prayers have been answered,’ Sister Euphemia said. ‘Her fever’s come down and she’s asleep. She’s still very ill,’ she added warningly, ‘and we shall have to take very good care of her.’

     Josse looked at her anxiously. ‘But she won’t – she’s not going to die?’

     ‘No, Josse,’ Euphemia said gently. ‘I don’t think she is.’

     Soon afterwards she stood up and announced she must be getting back to her patients. With the awful fear gone, Josse realised how tired he was; yawning, he stumbled away to his corner in the monks’ shelter, threw himself down fully dressed, huddled into his blankets and was soon soundly and dreamlessly asleep.

They did what they could for the man in the bed next to the Abbess’s recess. They washed him, bathed his hot face and tried to make him take some sips of the special water from Joanna’s flask. Sister Emanuel, who had the task of removing and folding his garments, found a small, wrapped parcel of some herbal mixture in the purse on his belt; Sister Euphemia thought it contained opium and, since the parcel only appeared to contain a small portion of what it had once held, they deduced that he had been dosing himself with it and decided that it could surely do no harm to give him the remainder. He was very close to death; anything was worth a try.

     By morning, he had regained consciousness. Of a sort: the drug must have been strong, for he seemed to be in some waking dream that was indistinguishable from reality. But the spell of lucidity did not last long and presently he slipped back into a coma.

Two days later, the infirmarer, Sister Tiphaine and Sister Caliste got their heads together for a brief discussion. There had been a total of forty-six cases of the foreign pestilence at Hawkenlye, out of which twenty-nine had died not counting poor murdered Nicol – and sixteen had recovered. Within the Hawkenlye community, they had lost dear Sister Beata, the young monk called Roger and the quiet little novice; another nun who worked in the laundry had become ill but recovered. A dozen recovering patients still lay weak and querulous in the Vale infirmary, where there was also the Abbess Helewise, slightly stronger now, and the man brought in on the night she almost died. He alone was still giving grave cause for concern for his fever remained high and he only emerged from his deep coma on rare and very brief occasions. Whenever he did so he was given water from Joanna’s flask.

     Since the night of his arrival, there had been no new cases of the sickness. The nuns hardly dared think it, let alone say it, but each was just starting to hope that the disease might just have run its course.

Inside the ward, Brother Firmin – who had recovered sufficiently to get up for an hour or so each day – went to sit by the unknown man’s bed. Waiting patiently until the man opened his eyes, he said, in the manner of one speaking to the deaf, ‘DO – YOU – KNOW – WHERE – YOU – ARE?’

     The man gave a wry smile. ‘Not in heaven,’ he muttered.

     Brother Firmin was faintly shocked. ‘Oh, dear, no!’ he said, wondering if he had just heard a blasphemy. Deciding that, if he had, then it was forgivable under the circumstances, he said, ‘You are at Hawkenlye Abbey, in the temporary infirmary that we have set up down in our Vale, where the holy water spring is situated, and our nursing nuns are doing their utmost to help you get better.’

     Before he had finished his little speech, the man had closed his eyes and wearily turned away. Firmin put out a tentative hand. ‘Are you in pain, friend?’ he asked. ‘Is there anything that I can do for you?’

     The man opened his eyes again. ‘I am dying,’ he said baldly.

     ‘Oh, you must not say that!’ Firmin told him. ‘There is always hope, and God is merciful.’

     The man’s eyes fixed on to Firmin’s in a stare so intense and blank that Firmin shrank back. ‘Is he?’ the man demanded. ‘Is there mercy even for one such as me?’

     ‘There is mercy for everyone,’ Firmin assured him. Then, made nervous by what he read in the man’s eyes, ‘Would you like me to send for a priest?’

     After a long pause, the man nodded. Then, as Brother Firmin made to call out to one of the nuns to fetch Father Gilbert, he caught the old monk’s sleeve. With an attempt at a smile, he said, ‘Better find one with time on his hands, Brother, for I have much to confess.’

The infirmarer had decided that she could no longer put up with Josse’s constant demands to be allowed in to see the Abbess. Almost sure now that the danger of infection was past, she put her head out through the doorway of the Vale ward, saw him in his usual place on the bench and told him he could come in. She did add, ‘But you can only stay with her for a few moments’; however, he had already leapt to his feet and rushed in past her and she was quite sure he could not have heard.

     Josse made himself walk slowly down the long ward. For over a week he had been imagining what was going on here and now he could see the aftermath with his own eyes. The floor was still damp from the latest scrubbing – Sister Euphemia’s nursing nuns had to be very thorough about scrubbing – but nevertheless, behind the aroma of lavender there was a lurking sickroom stench. Certain dark stains that refused to yield to the hot water and the brisk brush bore witness to where patients had uncontrollably voided liquids from the orifices of their weak, feverish bodies. Unoccupied cots had been stacked in a corner, stripped bare of their palliasses and of the covers. The remaining handful of patients were grouped around the middle of one side of the ward. One or two managed to give Josse a friendly smile as he passed by. All of them looked pale and frighteningly fragile.

     He passed the mystery man, who lay asleep; Josse was aware that Gervase de Gifford was waiting to question him and had undertaken the duty of informing the sheriff when the man was up to it. Trying to summon up righteous indignation – the man had probably killed Nicol and the Hastings merchant! – Josse’s resolve was undermined by pity.

     He had a fair idea of what to expect when at last he twitched aside the curtains around the Abbess’s bed and stared down at her.

     She was propped up on pillows and clad in a spotless white gown fastened chastely around the neck. Its sleeves extended to the wrist and her hands, emerging out of the smooth linen, lay folded upon the bedcovers. Her head was bare but for a simple white cap, beneath which he could see her reddish hair in short, soft curls. Her face was pale and her skin had a dryish look, as if any extreme expression might crack it clean open. Her eyes looked huge and were circled with dark rings.

     On seeing him, she risked everything and gave him a wide smile. ‘Dear Sir Josse,’ she said, and he noticed that her voice was weak and shaky, ‘how good it is to see you.’

     He knelt on the floor beside her bed. ‘My lady Abbess, I feared that this moment would never come.’

     ‘But it has,’ she answered. He felt her hand on his head – such a tiny, feeble touch! – and, raising his face, he looked up at her.

     ‘She came for me,’ the Abbess whispered. ‘I was on my way and she appeared at my side and asked me if I was sure I was ready to go. I saw – oh, I saw many things.’ She was studying him intently, something that he could not identify burning in the grey eyes. She was silent for a moment, then said, ‘What I saw ahead was so beautiful, Josse, that I could easily have slipped away and I am quite sure that I would have been happy. But I know now that it is not yet my time to go.’ Her smile was back. ‘So I came back.’

     He did not know what to say; either he must find the words to say all that was in his heart or else only the briefest response would do. Faced with the yawningly huge task of the former, he settled for the latter. He said gruffly, ‘I’m glad.’

     And he heard a sound he had thought never to hear again: she began to laugh.

     All too soon the curtain twitched back and Sister Euphemia appeared. ‘It’s very good to hear you laugh, my lady, but that’s enough for now. Sir Josse!’ She gave him a stern look.

     He raised the Abbess’s hand to his lips to give it a swift kiss and then, getting up, winked at her and followed the infirmarer out of the recess, letting the curtain fall behind him. Sister Euphemia, having assured herself that he had obeyed her and left the Abbess to rest, gave a nod and then hurried away up the ward to attend to a patient calling for water.

     Josse walked slowly after her. He glanced again at the stranger as he passed and noticed that the man was twisting from side to side in the bed, one hand reaching out as if in supplication. Going over to him, Josse said quietly, ‘What ails you?’