The Rose of the World

by Alys Clare

  She watched Dominic’s face. She saw doubt and anger and, finally, agony so severe that instinctively she reached out to him.

  He pushed her hands away. ‘She is eleven years old, Mother,’ he said, and his voice was like ice. ‘Could you not have taken better care of her?’

  Helewise felt as if she had been stabbed through the heart. She dropped her head, fighting tears. She sensed a swift movement beside her, and Josse’s arm went round her shoulders. She heard his words as from a great distance – he was saying it was not her fault, it was the result of mistaken identity, and that Dominic should take back his harsh comment – but she did not take them in.

  He blames me, she thought. He blames me and he hates me.

  A tear slid down her cheek.

  She was ushered to a chair, Josse holding her as if he feared she would fall, Sabin disentangling herself from her children and rushing to take Helewise’s hand. Then Dominic was before her, his face stiff as he said curtly, ‘I apologize, Mother. Apparently, I was wrong to put the blame on you.’

  She met his eyes. ‘She was, as you say, in my care,’ she said. ‘I will do my utmost to help you find her.’

  He studied her for a moment longer. Then he turned away.

  THREE

  Josse sat with Dominic and Gervase as they worked on how best to hunt for Rosamund. Helewise, still looking so stunned that Josse longed to comfort her, sat alone and silent at the end of Gervase’s long table. Gervase had already summoned a group of his most reliable men and, when Dominic had asked if somebody could ride over to the Old Manor to ask his brother Leofgar to come to help, Gervase had readily agreed. Now, as they waited for the others to assemble, the three of them divided up the terrain and decided who should lead the hunt in which sector.

  ‘We should each concentrate on the areas we know best,’ Gervase said. ‘This means you, Josse, concentrate on the forest between Hawkenlye Manor and the abbey.’

  ‘We have searched the ground there all night!’ Josse exclaimed impatiently. Although he knew it was sensible to sit here and organize the search so as to make best use of the available men, in his heart he felt they were wasting time and he longed to be out looking for Rosamund.

  Gervase looked at him, sympathy in his light eyes. ‘I know, old friend,’ he said, ‘but it was dark. You may well have missed something important.’

  ‘I’ll take the area east of the forest, centred on New Winnowlands and covering the roads and tracks to the coast,’ Dominic said. Josse glanced at him. His face was pale, and a muscle worked constantly at the point of his jaw. His pain and his anger were palpable. I would not, Josse thought, like to be the man who has taken Rosamund when her father finds him.

  ‘Good,’ Gervase was saying. ‘You are confident that your brother will join us, Dominic?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Very well. We will assign to him the area to the north and north-east of the town. I propose to put my most able deputy in charge of Tonbridge, and I will concentrate on the lands to the west, taking a band of men out towards Saxonbury, Hartfield and the Ashdown Forest.’

  ‘The forest is a royal preserve,’ Dominic said, frowning. ‘Is it not a waste of time to search there?’

  ‘Indeed, the king often rides there and would like to make it his own private hunting ground,’ Gervase replied, ‘but as yet there is nothing to prevent access.’

  ‘Providing you don’t hunt the deer,’ Josse muttered.

  ‘Yes, but where does that not apply?’ Gervase countered. ‘They say there are plans to fence in the whole forest, but for now it is as good a place to hide as any.’

  ‘I do not know it,’ Dominic said. ‘It is a forest, yet you speak of good hunting?’ He shook his head. ‘I cannot reconcile the two.’

  ‘You are thinking, perhaps, of the Wealden Forest that surrounds Hawkenlye,’ Josse said. ‘Aye, you’d be hard put to chase and fell a deer there, for the trees and the undergrowth grow so densely that the very tracks disappear in the spring. The Ashdown Forest is in truth a heath,’ he went on, ‘and quite different in nature from the woodland around Hawkenlye. You—’

  But Dominic put up a hand to silence him. The question answered, Dominic had more pressing matters on his mind. ‘My mother should go to the abbey,’ he said decisively, sending a glance in the direction of the silent figure at the end of the table. ‘People come and go there all the time. Basing herself there, she will be in a good position to keep her ears open for any whispered rumour of – of where my daughter may be.’

  Josse felt the onset of an agonizing conflict. Dominic’s suggestion was astute, for Hawkenlye was the closest sizeable community to the place where Rosamund had last been seen and, as Dominic had implied, had always been a centre for gossip and rumour. But he did not know, as Josse did, Helewise’s attitude to the place where she had lived and ruled for so long.

  She avoided it. She had explained to Josse that she did not wish her presence to undermine the new regime led by Abbess Caliste. Josse suspected there was more to it than that: he feared that part of her regretted her decision to leave and wished she was still Hawkenlye’s abbess.

  Either way, she would not take kindly to a curt order from her son that she should go and stay there . . .

  Helewise had bowed her head, and she had not uttered a word. It was up to Josse to say so.

  ‘Your mother will not return to the abbey,’ he said quietly. ‘Abbess Caliste is in charge now, and Helewise does not wish to remind the community that once they were led by someone else.’

  Dominic’s face twisted into a grimace. ‘She will surely not allow such a consideration to outweigh the present emergency?’

  ‘I think she will,’ Josse said.

  There was a brief, tense silence. Then, turning to Helewise, Dominic broke it with a single, icy word: ‘Mother?’

  Josse watched as slowly she raised her head and met her son’s eyes. ‘I will not return to the abbey,’ she said.

  ‘But you—’ Dominic began furiously.

  Now it was his turn to be silenced. Helewise said, quietly but with infinite authority, ‘Dominic, I will not be persuaded. What you suggest is not possible.’

  Dominic opened his mouth to protest again but, eyes fixed to his mother’s grim face, he subsided.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said calmly. ‘I will not go to the abbey, but I do agree that what you suggest is sensible. I will lodge close by, and I will send someone to be my eyes and ears within the community. That will serve as well.’

  Dominic snorted. ‘It rather depends who you send.’

  ‘Leave me to worry about that,’ Helewise flashed back. Then, regret filling her face as if suddenly she had recalled why they were all there, she added gently, ‘I promised to do my best to help, son, and I will.’

  He looked at her for a long moment. Then he nodded.

  There was a sudden commotion in the courtyard outside, and a group of a dozen men erupted into the hall. While they were still settling down to hear the sheriff’s instructions, there was the sound of a horse’s hooves clattering across the yard, swiftly followed by the arrival of Leofgar Warin.

  He went to greet his mother. Then he spotted his younger brother and, without a word, went across to take him in his arms in a tight embrace. Breaking away, he turned to Gervase and said, ‘What do you want me to do?’

  Josse was heading for the House in the Woods. He planned to gather his household around him and tell them that they were to search every track, path and animal trail until they found some trace of Rosamund. She had stood in the place that Meggie had pointed out, he reflected, and someone had taken her away. Unless they flew, Josse thought, they must have left a mark of their passage and, however small it is, we must find it.

  He was riding as hard as he could, given that he was leading a second horse. Where Helewise was bound, she had no need of Daisy, and Josse was taking the mare back to the House in the Woods. He and Helewise had ridden back up the hill from Tonbridge, and he had left her
at the point where the track to Hawkenlye Abbey branched off the main road that circled the forest. She had not told him what she planned to do. When they had parted, she had done her best to reassure him, but she had failed.

  ‘I shall be perfectly safe, Josse dear,’ she had said, looking up at him as he struggled to control both Alfred and her mare, the horses excited from the hard ride and restless to be moving again.

  ‘How will I know?’ he asked. He heard the pleading tone in his voice.

  She smiled. ‘You will have to trust to God and the good spirits of this place to make sure that I am.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Josse, what else would you have me do?’ she demanded. ‘Dominic blames me for Rosamund’s disappearance, and he is right to do so for she was left in my care. Do you think I could wait back at home, helping Tilly prepare endless soup, while everyone else searches? Do you?’ she insisted, when he did not answer.

  ‘No,’ he said gruffly.

  ‘Well, then.’ She reached up and took his hand. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll be all right. I’ll keep in touch.’

  Then she had slapped Alfred hard on the rump and, before Josse was aware, he found himself cantering away.

  The only tiny spot of comfort in the whole exchange, he now thought as he slowed his pace for the final approach to the house, was that she had referred to his house as home.

  That, in this terrible day, was something . . .

  As soon as Josse was out of sight, Helewise stepped off the road and entered the forest. She knew the tracks well, and it was worth the risk, for she was in a hurry. Furthermore, if she stayed on the road there was always the possibility that Josse would double back and come after her. He was, she knew, deeply unhappy about leaving her.

  She walked fast, stopping now and again to get her bearings. She did not habitually cross the forest from north to south, but she knew where she was heading and at this time of year the trees were all but bare, allowing her to be guided by the sun. It was faint today, obscured by high, thin cloud, but she could tell where it was. The air was cold; she huddled deeper inside her thick cloak and tightened the strings of her hood.

  She had not enjoyed parting from Josse when he was so very anxious about her. She knew what he felt for her, and her love for him was equally strong, even if she had no idea how to express it. But it was not the time to dwell on her failings there, she reprimanded herself. Not when there was another, far greater, failure to deal with.

  Dominic’s coldness towards her had been perfectly understandable but, oh, how it had hurt! She turned her mind from that, too. Nothing short of returning Rosamund to him would alter his dark mood, and she would just have to suffer. She did not even dare to think what Paradisa was going through.

  It was heartening that Leofgar had raced to offer his support. Helewise knew, however, that her elder son would not be able to go on helping indefinitely. Leofgar was a man of importance now, with connections to the fringe of court society. Whatever he might privately think about the king – he was careful not to say, but Helewise did not need to hear it in words – he gave every appearance of being a loyal, responsible subject. The king had announced he was going to pay a visit to Leofgar and Rohaise in the very near future, and Helewise was sure that, much as Leofgar would like to go on searching for his young niece, his brother would understood that he had to put his own family first.

  It helped her, a little, to be doing something positive to help the search. What she had said to Josse was the truth: she could not have borne returning to the House in the Woods to sit waiting for news. In her old life, she reflected, her conscience would have made her do just that, since it was the hardest thing. Now, once more a woman in control of her own comings and goings, she was free to do what she chose.

  She strode on, ignoring her fatigue and the ache in her legs. She was used to walking – they all were – but now the demands she was making on herself were extreme. To take her mind off the pain, she thought about where she was going.

  The abbey was out of bounds to her, for the reasons that dear Josse had so eloquently given. It was not that the community would not have welcomed her, and that included Abbess Caliste, for there was a great depth of understanding and love between the former abbess and the present one. It was that the abbey would not be best served by Helewise’s return, since, despite their best efforts not to do so, the nuns and the monks would not be able to help a very understandable tendency to remember – and undoubtedly talk at length about – how life used to be in Helewise’s day. Were there to be some emergency, there could very well be a few of the older ones who turned to Helewise and not Abbess Caliste for guidance. That would not do.

  Helewise did not feel that she could take up her abode in the little cell next to St Edmund’s Chapel, no matter how much she longed to, for much the same reasons. The chapel and its attendant accommodation were outside the abbey walls but, all the same, everyone would know she was there. You just couldn’t help that sort of news spreading in a place like the abbey.

  No. What she had in mind was somewhere a great deal more remote from the Hawkenlye community. It depended on two things: whether she succeeded in finding it, and whether the person who had very recently been living there would permit her to stay.

  She found the place quite easily, only missing her way once. The question of whether or not she would be allowed to stay did not arise, for there was nobody there.

  As Helewise unfastened the intricately-twisted knot of rope that fastened the door of the little hut, she wondered where Meggie was and when she would be back. Then she put aside her speculation and set about the tasks she had to do. She collected water from the stream and several loads of kindling and dead wood from the surrounding woodland. She got a fire going in the hearth inside the hut, for it would be cold that night. She checked on Meggie’s food supplies, relieved to discover that, although she would very soon be hungry unless she foraged for more, she would not starve. Once she had seen to the practicalities, she went outside into the little clearing and turned her mind to the reason that she had come.

  Being much closer to the abbey than the House in the Woods, the hut made a more convenient base for her task. But there was more to her choice than that; much more. She needed an intermediary who could slip in and out of the abbey without arousing interested comment, someone who did it all the time and who people were used to seeing coming and going, and this was the best place to find her. The person she had in mind had once lived mostly within the abbey walls as a nun, although it had been common knowledge that she had close allegiances with the strange forest people who had once frequented the area. Now they were gone, or so it was said, or perhaps they had become better at remaining hidden. The wildwood was steadily shrinking as the population grew and men nibbled away at its fringes, bringing more and more land under cultivation. In addition, the old tolerance of those who lived a different life and worshipped God in another guise was fast becoming nothing but a memory. In lands far away to the south, the church had taken up arms against those it accused of heresy, and it was only a matter of time before the same harsh and narrow rule was applied everywhere.

  It was no wonder they had gone, Helewise mused.

  Yet she was one of the few people who suspected that they had not all deserted the Hawkenlye wildwood. She knew for certain of two who remained. One stayed out of love for Hawkenlye’s abbess, for she was her sister. The other had her own unfathomable reasons, and it was she whom Helewise was waiting for.

  She stood quite still in the centre of the clearing. The little stream sang its bubbling song away to her right, and somewhere a blackbird protested at her presence. She wondered if she should venture out into the forest and start looking for the woman she sought, but quickly she dismissed the thought. They always knew when an outsider was in their domain. If Helewise was patient, by some mysterious method word would be passed and the one she was mentally summoning would come.

  ‘Helewise.’

  She had
no warning, and when the quiet voice spoke right in her ear, Helewise jerked round so violently that she felt a stab of pain in her neck.

  ‘That’ll need a rub with some oil and some warming herbs,’ the voice went on. ‘You never have taken enough care of yourself, have you?’

  Helewise stared into the watchful eyes and studied the weather-beaten, deeply lined face. The newcomer opened her arms, and Helewise walked into her firm embrace. Then she took a step back, and she and Tiphaine, former herbalist of Hawkenlye Abbey, exchanged a warm and loving smile.

  It was neither woman’s habit to waste time, for years spent in an abbey had cured them of that. Tiphaine was first to speak. ‘I know why you are here,’ she said. ‘The little girl.’

  ‘Yes, my granddaughter,’ Helewise agreed. ‘Her name is Rosamund and she’s—’

  ‘I know,’ Tiphaine interrupted gently.

  Helewise wondered how she knew, but almost instantly answered her own unspoken question. ‘Meggie,’ she breathed.

  ‘Meggie, aye,’ Tiphaine said. ‘She and the child were here together yesterday. She’s a pretty little thing, and she has a generous heart.’

  ‘Yes, she—’ But Helewise’s eyes had filled with tears and she could not trust her voice.

  Tiphaine stepped closer. ‘She is alive and as yet she is unharmed,’ she murmured.

  Hope flared in Helewise’s heart. ‘You know this? You have seen her?’

  Tiphaine shook her head. ‘Not since she and Meggie left this place to return to the House in the Woods.’

  ‘Then how can you be so sure she’s not—’ Helewise could not say the word dead. ‘How do you know she’s unharmed?’

  Tiphaine looked at her for a long moment. ‘Such a death would have been so far from the natural ways of the woodland that we would have felt it,’ she said. As Helewise opened her mouth to protest, Tiphaine stopped her. ‘Do not ask, Helewise. I cannot explain further. You will just have to believe me.’