The Squire’s Tale (4 page)

St. Benedict’s Rule against idle talk in the cloister, though mostly let lapse anymore, was kept through Lent to help the nuns hold their minds to readying for the coming grief and glory of Easter through penance and purification. Frevisse, for one, was always glad for the silence’s return but was smiling at Dame Juliana’s open happiness while carefully, carefully penning, “of the old law they fasted four times in the year against four high feasts that they had” because in her own way she was as much enjoying her work and the warm, fair day as Dame Juliana was. St. Frideswide’s priory had been through narrow times, troubled by an ill-managing prioress and closer to utter poverty than St. Benedict’s Rule required, but through these past two years of their new prioress Domina Elisabeth ruling them with a firm grasp of necessities, the nunnery had gained back its peace and something of its prosperity. Not all the hurt done by their last prioress was mended yet but the copying of books was making a needed addition to their income and last autumn Domina Elisabeth had persuaded two Banbury families to put their daughters to school at St. Frideswide’s, with hope there would be others. Moreover, Abbot Gilberd, her brother, had found them a wealthy Northampton merchant’s daughter to be a novice, a large and very welcome dowry coming with her.

Happily, Sister Margrett had proved to be as welcome as her dowry, a bright-faced, even-humored girl who had taken readily to nunnery life and would take her final vows come Whitsuntide, bringing the nunnery’s count of nuns again up to ten after Sister Cecely’s flight back into the world last year. It was a pity the girl was not fair-handed with a pen yet, Frevisse thought while pausing to straighten and stretch her back, because someone else at the scrivening would be useful. With so few nuns in St. Frideswide’s, all had more than merely one set of duties, even Domina Elisabeth. Besides scrivening, Frevisse in the last change of offices had been made precentress, in charge of seeing that all the nuns were ready for such differences in the daily seven Offices of prayer as came with the changing holy days and turnings of the year. Along with that, she had to see to Sister Margrett being fully taught all she needed to know about the Offices before she took her final vows and, besides that, to overseeing the educating of Helen and Lucy, the little girls from Banbury. Being biddable children, they were no great trouble and Frevisse had found she minded the task less than she had thought to, but she had also become skilled at finding things that other nuns could teach them; this afternoon she had given them over to Dame Claire and Sister Thomasine for instruction in medicinal herbs until Vespers and was not missing them, instead was welcoming the chance to gain on the needed copying work.

In the while of wind-hush then, with only the small sounds of gardening and the scritch of quill tips across parchment to touch the quiet, she went on, “Fasting it cleanses a man’s flesh of evil stirring and inclination to the sin of gluttony and of lechery; for these be sins of the flesh…” losing track of time until a sudden loud knocking at the cloister’s outer door startled heads up both at desks and in the garth. St. Frideswide’s was remote enough in the country for visitors to be uncommon and so small that someone—servant or nun—was almost always in hearing if someone knocked to come in; no one was needed to constantly keep the door into the guesthall yard and now, with a surfeit of nuns to hand, Domina Elisabeth said “Dame Emma,” probably because she was presently the only one among them on her feet, taking up a basket of dead leaves cleared from a garden bed. Dame Emma, short and round and happiest when being noticed, smiled and nodded, set the basket down, made to wipe her garden-dirty hands on her skirts, thought better of it, remembered the rag Dame Juliana had left on the low wall for just that use, snatched it up, and bustled away, cleaning her hands as she went.

From her desk Domina Elisabeth said quietly, “Continue,” and heads ducked to their work again though perhaps not so deeply as before, and certainly in the garth Dame Juliana and Sister Amicia shifted to be facing doorward, the better to see who entered. Frevisse, realizing that if she could notice that, she was giving way to unnecessary curiosity, too, bowed her head more deeply to her work, eyes firmly down, because in Lent more especially than any other time, the mind should be turned from the world to the spirit. Curiosity about whomever was at the door was surely worldly and she curbed it, fixing instead on the words in front of her—“Then in your fast think on your death, and share your food with such that have not what you have, and then God will feed you at his table in Heaven”—even when Dame Emma came bustling back to whisper something eagerly to Domina Elisabeth who, after pause presumably to stopper inkpot and wipe pen, rose and followed her away.

Unfortunately, despite all her good intent, Frevisse could not close her ears as readily as she kept her eyes down and knew by the footfalls that it was a man and a woman—no, two women—who entered and went away with Domina Elisabeth up the stairs to her parlor with Dame Emma making a little bustle after them.

Beyond the low cloister wall, Sister Amicia whispered, “Who do you think…” But, “Hush,” Dame Perpetua whispered back at her and with a sigh that loudly mixed regret and resignation Sister Amicia hushed. Frevisse, resolutely holding her own curiosity in check, kept on with the copying, trying to pray the words as she wrote them to make her work and worship into one thing and was succeeding when Dame Emma came back into the cloister walk and along it to her, to lean over and whisper, “Domina Elisabeth bids you come to her.”

Holding back from unseemly haste, Frevisse wiped her quill-point clean, stoppered her inkpot, made certain the parchment was well-weighted in place, and rose to her feet, paused then as all the nuns were used to doing of late whenever they stood up, waiting for the light-headedness of Lent’s fasting to pass—as the body grew lighter, so did its burden on the soul, leaving the mind more free to reach toward heaven—then nodded to Dame Emma and followed her away along the walk toward the stairs, Dame Emma happily trotting ahead as if Frevisse, after more than twenty years in St. Frideswide’s, would not be able to find her own way.

• The prioress’ parlor was the most furnished room in the nunnery, with two chairs, a table covered by a woven Spanish carpet, embroidered cushions on the window seat, even a fireplace, because the prioress must needs deal more often than anyone else with guests important enough to need impressing or deserving of more comfort than otherwise there was to be had in St. Frideswide’s. Frevisse was too used to it to notice more than that while Domina Elisabeth was seated in the better of the two chairs, the man was on his feet beside the other one and the two women were standing across the room at the window as if too uncertain to sit.

That much Frevisse took in before she sank in a low curtsy to Domina Elisabeth but as she straightened, Domina Elisabeth said, “Master Fenner thinks you may remember him,” and Frevisse looked at him, confused for a moment by the name, before she exclaimed, “Robert!” and went toward him with an outheld hand and unfeigned delight.

His smile matching her own, he stepped forward to meet her, to take her hand and bow over it. “I wasn’t sure you’d remember me, my lady. It’s been a time since we last met.”

‘Six years? Seven?“ Not since her uncle’s funeral and then only very briefly, with only one other time together before that, when there had been two murders in the priory and Robert had not only helped but once protected her. He had been barely into his young manhood then, a very minor squire to his cousin Sir Walter Fenner, but by the look of him the years since then had been better to him than he had had hope of when she last saw him. His hair might be somewhat farther back from his forehead than it had been, but to judge by his well-made doublet of crimson wool, high leather riding boots, and fine dark-blue cloak laid on the empty chair beside him, he had prospered. But he was also wearing a quilted leathern jack over the fine doublet, as if there might have been fear of trouble on his way here, and that and something in his face brought her to ask, ”You’re well?“ with an edge of deeper question to it than she might have otherwise had.

‘Very well,“ he said almost convincingly enough, and gave her no chance for asking more but turned toward the women across the room, saying, ”And here, please you, is my ward, Katherine Stretton.“

The younger of the women—hardly more than a girl; as young as Robert had been when Frevisse first met him— curtsied gravely, her eyes respectfully lowered, making it difficult to tell anything about her except that, like him, she was well-dressed, her kendal-green gown high-waisted, simple-collared, full-skirted, and that she was unmarried, her dark hair worn braided back, the veil and wimple she must have worn while riding here laid aside with her cloak on the window seat behind her.

‘And her gentlewoman Mistress Dionisia,“ Robert said.

Mistress Dionisia was perhaps Frevisse’s own age, plainly dressed in a gray gown with crisply coifed white linen wimple and veil, the perfect outward image of a servant, but as she deeply curtsied, the sharp assessing look from under her brows that she gave Frevisse suggested she would willingly be Katherine’s protector if need be. Frevisse, with a first twinge of alarm, wondered from what Katherine needed to be protected but merely bowed her head to both women and looked to Domina Elisabeth who said easily, “There’s been a little trouble and Master Fenner has asked that Katherine and her woman be allowed to stay with us a time.”

With a second twinge, this time more definite, Frevisse repeated, outwardly matching her prioress’ calm, “Trouble?”

Domina Elisabeth looked to Robert to answer that, and with a quietness that Frevisse found she did not quite believe in, he said, “There’s been an attempt to force Katherine into an unwanted marriage by carrying her off against her will. Besides that, there’s presently a dispute over my wife’s dower lands. If we fail in our hope to bring it to arbitration and it comes to…” he paused over what word he wanted, settling again for the usefully vague, “… trouble, it would be better that Katherine was out of its midst, not in danger of being seized simply because she was readily to hand. For the same reason, I’ve brought deeds and charters concerning my wife’s lands here for safekeeping.” He pointed to a small chest on the floor beside him. “The ones that, if we lost them, would make proof of my lady’s rights difficult. Your prioress has kindly given leave for Katherine to stay and promised keeping of them, too.” He bowed his head slightly to Domina Elisabeth. “For which she has my thanks and more.”

With a smile, the prioress bent hers in return, then said to Frevisse, “I think the documents will do best in the sacristy.” Where the priory’s more costly worldly goods—the church plate, the priest’s embroidered vestments, the deeds and charters of the priory’s own lands—were kept. “And Katherine will be in your charge.”

Frevisse refrained from more than opening her eyes a little wider in question that Domina Elisabeth smoothly answered, “She can help with teaching Helen and Lucy, giving her occupation while she’s here and leaving you more time for other duties.”

Such as the Banbury councilman’s wife’s new book,
she did not say but Frevisse knew it was meant and bent her head in pleased acceptance, murmuring, “Of course, my lady.”

‘I also thought that since you and Master Fenner are acquainted, you could see his documents to the sacristy. He’ll carry the chest there for us?“

‘Of course, my lady,“ Robert answered.

But Frevisse said, half on a question and not because she was unwilling but careful of how Sister Amicia, presently sacristan and therefore with the church and sacristy in her charge, might feel about her place being usurped even so briefly, “It’s rightly Sister Amicia’s to do?”

‘Master Fenner asked to see you and you needed to be told about Katherine and may as well deal with this, too,“ Domina Elisabeth said. ”It’s enough that one of you be interrupted at your work.“

Cleared of fault no matter how Sister Amicia took it, Frevisse smiled at Robert. “Then I’ll be pleased to.”

‘I’ll make my farewells then, please you,“ Robert said to both her and Domina Elisabeth, ”and leave directly I’ve set the chest away.“

‘You’re not staying the night?“ Frevisse asked, surprised.

Domina Elisabeth answered for him. “He wants it noticed as little as possible that he was here at all. For Katherine’s greater safety.”

Robert made a slight bow in agreement with that and crossed to Katherine, held out his hands to her, and said as she took hold of them, “No need to fear. You’ll be home again soon.”

Looking for the moment very young, her eyes large and fixed on his face, Katherine clung to his hands, careful, Frevisse saw, of his right one where some of the fingers were bound and splinted even as she pleaded, “You’ll come for me as soon as may be?”

‘I’ll come myself or else send someone for you with token that it’s safe. Just as I promised.“

She managed a smile. “Remember you promised to be careful of yourself, too.”

‘As careful as may be,“ he said.

Little girl turning back into young woman, Katherine clicked her tongue at him with pretend impatience. “I’d like a better promise than that, sir.”

Robert laughed at her. “It’s the best promise you’re going to have.” He drew her toward him and kissed her on the forehead. “Just mind you’re as careful of yourself as you want me to be of me.”

‘Will I have much choice otherwise, being in here?“

‘I trust not,“ he said, let her go and stepped back, ready to take his leave, but she reached out, caught him by the wrist, and said, a little desperately, ”You’ll be in my prayers.“