A Gathering of Ghosts

by Karen Maitland

  The outlaw glanced up at it and gave a harsh caw of laughter. ‘Maybe I’ll slice this little man’s belly open, spill his guts, and he can have the pleasure of watching that hawk pick them over as he dies. Bird looks hungry for his supper, what do you reckon?’

  From the grins on the faces of all three men, I was certain they’d have carried out their threat in a flea’s breath and taken pleasure in it too. There was naught either Todde or I could do, save stare in dismay as the outlaws dragged the donkey to the top of the hill, every pick and shovel, pot and blanket that we’d owned along with it. For a moment, I saw the two men and the ass standing like grey rocks against the sky, then they vanished, as if someone had taken a giant cloth and wiped them away.

  As soon as they were safely out of sight, the outlaw holding Todde whipped the blade away and kneed his backside, sending him sprawling face down in the mud. The robber took off after his companions and was gone.

  Todde was bent double, shaking and retching, though his belly was empty. I thought it best to leave him be. Men don’t like a woman to see them afraid, though I didn’t blame him – only a mooncalf wouldn’t be scared when he’d come that close to dying. He was straightening himself when I heard a shout on the track behind us. A man was trotting towards us on the back of a stocky little horse. In a flash, Todde had drawn his knife and was running back down the slope. He darted in front of me and stopped, his arms thrown wide as if he was trying to defend me. I stared at his ragged back. I couldn’t imagine my own brother doing that for me.

  ‘If you’re thinking to rob us, you’re too late,’ Todde bellowed. ‘Thieves just made off with all we had, so you’d best get on your way afore I do you some mischief.’

  ‘Rest easy, sir,’ the man said. ‘I’m no outlaw, merely a hardworking tinner.’

  Shaken though I was, I couldn’t drag my gaze from the man’s face. He had such a bad squint in one eye that it was staring into his hooked nose, and his pale, wispy beard did not conceal the absence of a chin. His mouth receded straight into his puckered neck. He looked like a plucked chicken.

  He swung his leg over the saddle and slid off the horse. ‘Saw them dragging your beast off, but I was too far away to help.’

  ‘Caught me off guard, they did,’ Todde muttered sullenly. ‘But if you hadn’t distracted me by riding at the girl, I’d have been after them in a flash and I’d not have stopped until I took back what was mine.’

  The man shook his head sadly. ‘It’s as well you didn’t catch up with them. You’d be lying out on that tor with a knife in your guts if you had. They’ve been known to cut a man’s throat just for the fun of it. And it’s not just travellers they prey on. They’ll pick off any tinner who’s fool enough to be working alone.’

  Todde frowned and took a pace forward. ‘Here, did you say you’re a tinner?’

  The man nodded. ‘Gleedy they call me, on account of . . .’ He pointed at his squint eye and laughed. ‘Work for Master Odo. He owns the tinners’ rights to the valley over yonder. There’s dozens of men stream for him there. If you’re looking for work in these parts, he might take you on.’

  Todde shook his head vehemently. ‘I’ll work for no man. I know how it is – the master standing there supping while the men break their backs, then he takes all the tin they’ve sweated for and tosses them a crooked penny for their trouble. Well, he’ll not be using me as his donkey. I’ll stream for myself and what I earn I keep. I’ve got rights, you know. Can dig on any land I please that’s not being already worked for tin, doesn’t matter who owns it. That’s the King’s law,’ he added, jerking his chin up as if challenging the tinner to disagree.

  ‘I’ll not argue with that,’ Gleedy said. ‘But how are you going to dig with no tools?’

  ‘What’s it to you?’ Todde demanded.

  Gleedy shrugged. ‘Just being neighbourly. But I’m not one to force help on those that don’t want it.’ He made as if to climb back on the horse.

  But I edged forward. ‘Wait! You can’t blame him for being chary after what’s just happened.’

  Gleedy lowered his foot and turned.

  I grimaced at Todde, trying to make him see sense. ‘Listen to him, Todde. You can’t dig with your bare hands, and even if you could start streaming, it might be days or weeks before you found tin and then you’ve got to take it somewhere to sell. How are you going to eat till then?’

  Gleedy nodded sagely. ‘Master Odo doesn’t need to go looking for men to hire. He’s any number coming to him begging for work, ’specially now food is so scarce. Turned three men away just yesterday and they were all strapping lads. But, deep down, he’s a heart as soft as a virgin’s breast. If I was to tell him of your misfortune and how you’ve a crippled woman to feed, he might give you a chance. Worth a try, isn’t it?’

  I felt the heat of my fury and indignation rising to my face and had to force myself not to stalk away. Pride doesn’t fill an empty belly.

  Todde opened his mouth as if he would object, but Gleedy jumped back in before he could. ‘I know you want to be your own master and so you shall, if you play it right. Master Odo would pay you a generous sum for each pound of tin you dug and that’s a rich seam he’s found. You’d be able to put food in your bellies and save a good bit too. So, by my reckoning, if you were to work for him a month or so, you’d easily earn enough in that time to buy the tools you’d need to set up on your own.’

  Todde still didn’t seem convinced, but clearly he couldn’t think of anything better.

  Gleedy told us to wait while he rode ahead to speak to the master. He knew how to handle Master Odo, he said, and it seemed he did, for a while later we saw him riding back with a grin as broad as a barrel.

  ‘Master Odo’s even got an empty cottage for you, all ready and waiting, it is. You come along with me.’

  We followed him up the track, then turned off along a broad path, churned up by the hoofs of many horses. In the wettest places rocks, wood and bundles of bracken had been thrown down to make stepping-stones through the mire, but the mud oozed over the top when we trod on them. The track wound up a steep rise. I couldn’t see so much as a byre, much less a cottage. Then I caught sight of a huge column of dense black smoke rising up from the other side of the hill, as if a great dragon lay coiled there.

  Todde saw it too and yelled in alarm to Gleedy, ‘Something afire over yonder.’

  Gleedy reined in his horse and turned, waiting for us to catch up. He gave another of his wide grins, showing a mouthful of teeth so crooked and crowded, it looked as if he’d grown twice the number of any normal man.

  ‘That smoke? It’s from the blowing-house. New it is,’ he added proudly. ‘Every man used to have to crush the rock and find wood to burn the ore before he could take it to a stannary town. Even then it was worth only half its weight for it had to be smelted again there. Now it’s all burned together and the fire’s so hot it has to be done just once. That’s Master Odo’s doing, and it doesn’t come cheap, I can tell you. When you think on it, those outlaws did you a favour. If you’d been working for yourself you’d have been put to four times the labour. Come on!’

  His horse ambled on, evidently knowing the path so well that it was able to step on to tussocks of grass to avoid the worst of the mire. There were no sounds out here, save for the mournful cry of a bird and our feet squelching through the mud. I’d never known such quiet and a strange peace settled on me. I felt welcomed, wanted, as if the land had thrown a blanket of softest wool around me and gathered me up into its arms.

  But as we breasted the rise, the noise that burst in my ears made me stagger backwards: iron hammers smashing granite, stones crashing into buckets, the whinnying of packhorses, the shouts of men, the bellows of women and the yells of children. I had never heard such a violent clamour, even at St Stephen’s fair. It was as if the ground had yawned wide before me and I was staring down into the pit of Hell.

  Chapter 10

  Prioress Johanne

  Sebastia
n was quiet now. He had suffered another of his night terrors. I say ‘night’, but they came upon him just as frequently during the day. He’d shake and whimper, trying to crawl away from something only he could see, but his twisted, wasted limbs would not support him, and even the few feet he managed left him pale as death and sweating in pain. I held him in my arms, murmuring softly and stroking his long hair as he fell into an exhausted sleep. His hair and beard were as white as sea foam but soft and silky, like a baby’s. He allowed the sisters to wash and gently comb them, but they could not cut them. He shrank in terror whenever he saw the glint of shears or a blade near his face, even if it was in my hands.

  I laid him back on the sheepskin and watched him for a few moments to make sure he had not woken. Then I pulled the rush screen across to close off his bed and edged away.

  The boy was sitting alone on a bed at the opposite end of the infirmary. I had ordered he be housed there after the death of Father Guthlac. Basilia could not keep leaving the infirmary to tend him in the pilgrims’ hall, and Melisene, the priory’s hosteller, said he was making the other travellers uneasy, although when I pressed her she was forced to admit he had done nothing to disturb them. And that, it seemed, was the problem – he did nothing.

  I knew Melisene wanted the boy out of her hall. She was accustomed to raucous pedlars, chattering pilgrims and old men-at-arms who ate heartily and drank deeply, but mostly, unless they were trapped by sudden snow or dense fog, these travellers were away about their business during the day, leaving the hall empty, so that she and the lay sisters could sweep, straighten pallets and mend fires in peace without, as Melisene put it, ‘the idle getting under my feet’. But the child never moved, and that unnerved the servants. It wasn’t natural, they muttered, especially not for a boy.

  I walked down the length of the hall, pausing to speak with the other patients as I passed. When I reached the corner where the boy sat, I pulled a stool close to his bed and sat down. I took care not to touch him, fearing to startle him, but he flinched away as if he sensed someone was close to him. He looked even thinner and paler than I recalled, his wild dark curls framing a face that was as white as breath on a frosty morning, the skin almost transparent. Was he ill?

  ‘I am Prioress Johanne. Do you remember my voice?’

  He turned his blank stare towards me. The dancing candle flame glittered in the pupils of his dark eyes, like the sun reflected on the surface of a deep pool. His eyes were so bright and clear that, for a moment, I was convinced he must be able to see, but when I passed my hand close to his face, he did not blink or move.

  Basilia came bustling over, an anxious look on her plump features, as if she was afraid I’d come to find fault. ‘The boy’s been fed, Prioress, though he still makes no attempt to spoon anything down himself or feel for a piece of bread. He’ll bite and chew it when it’s put against his mouth, but . . .’ she faltered, staring down at him, ‘. . . even the changeling children we’ve had brought here soon learn how to feed themselves. They’re so greedy for food they’d snatch from anyone’s trencher.’

  ‘Perhaps those who had the care of him fed him like a baby.’

  The boy’s head was still turned towards me, but his eyes seemed fixed on some point behind me in the hall. His stare was so intense that, even though I knew he was sightless, I found myself looking round to follow his gaze, but could see only one of the other patients who lay tossing wildly and whimpering in her sleep, as if she was having a terrible dream. For a moment, I almost thought the boy was . . . I reproved myself sternly. The child had done nothing. He hadn’t moved. The woman was doubtless in pain, which was making her restless. That was all.

  ‘We cannot keep calling him the boy, Sister Basilia. He must have a name.’

  ‘But he still hasn’t spoken, Prioress. He can’t seem to tell us who he is.’ Basilia lowered her voice, her gaze flicking sideways towards him, as if she was afraid to look at him directly. ‘He may have been born dumb, or whatever robbed him of his sight might have taken his voice too or his memory.’

  ‘Then until we can find out who he is, we shall call him Cosmas after the great saint and physician who protects the blind.’

  I grasped the child’s hand, which still felt as cold as granite. He jerked, but did not pull it from mine. ‘Cosmas,’ I pronounced slowly and clearly. ‘You’ – I prodded his chest to make my meaning clearer – ‘will be called Cosmas.’

  I watched his face for any sign that he had heard or understood. The candle flame still reflected in his black pupils, but I could have sworn that it had turned blood red. Startled, I dropped his hand and stared up at the candle guttering on the wall, thinking it must be smoking or tainted, but it was still burning yellow, and when I looked back into Cosmas’s eyes that was how it burned there too, like any true reflection. The flame must simply have flickered in a sudden draught. What was wrong with me? I was starting to imagine things, like Sister Fina. I had spent too many hours lying awake, fretting over the arrival of Brother Nicholas. That was the cause. I rose and drew Basilia away from the boy, trying not to betray my momentary disquiet.

  ‘How does he respond to his eyes being bathed in the holy well?’

  Basilia’s cheeks and neck flushed, and her gaze shifted to the painting of the Blessed Virgin on the wall, as if she was looking for divine protection or absolution. It was hard to know which.

  ‘He’s not yet been to the well . . . I would have asked Sister Fina to take him, but she’s not come into the infirmary these many days and I had to stay with the patients. Poor things, they are still so distressed over dear Father Guthlac’s death. They were all so fond of him – some of the older ones had known him since they were young . . . And we’ve all been so busy trying to make sure Brother Nicholas would not discover anything to find fault with.’

  The longer she babbled, the more excuses tumbled out, so thick and fast that I knew none was quite the truth.

  ‘I understand, Sister Basilia, but I insist you take Cosmas to the holy well tomorrow, whatever your duties here. I am sure the servants can manage the patients for the brief time you are absent. The boy was brought to us for healing and we must have as much faith as those who entrusted him to us. Ask Sister Fina to open the well early for you and take him there before the pilgrims are admitted. If he becomes distressed when the water touches him, it will not upset them. Do it, Sister Basilia. I will hear no excuses.’

  The sudden rapping at my door sent my quill sliding across the parchment, leaving a trail of black ink. I hastily dabbed at it before it could dry, cursing. I was angry with myself for jumping like a guilty child: I’d no reason to feel shame. All the same I moved swiftly to the far corner of the room, where I had dragged my narrow bed away from the wall. A section of panelling had been lifted out to reveal a gap, just wide enough to squeeze through. The tiny chamber beyond had been designed as a private chapel and, should the need ever arise, a place of safety in case of attack. But it served another purpose now: it contained a stout chest standing hard against one wall, and it was into this that I slid the parchment and small bag of coins.

  The knocking came again, more urgently this time. I stepped swiftly out, closing the wooden panel and pushing my bed back against it. Satisfied that all was safely concealed I pulled back the bolt on the door of my chamber.

  Sister Clarice pushed the door barely wide enough to slip through, then shut it again, leaning on it and panting a little, as if she had been hurrying. Tiny beads of sweat glistened in the furrows of her forehead in spite of the chill weather. She reached into her leather scrip and pulled out a bag, which she held towards me with a triumphant smile.

  ‘Three more rents collected, Prioress.’

  ‘Did any complain?’

  She grimaced. ‘Master Rohese almost refused, saying that it was a week early, but I told him that if he waited until the due time then a brother knight would be collecting the monies owed. They’d search every corner and cranny of his byres and barns, and record ever
ything down to the last egg and bale of wool to find reason to demand double from him.’

  ‘Sister! You should not have said that. We don’t know that Brother Nicholas has any such intention. No knight of St John would seek to take more from any man than was due to God and to his servants.’

  As prioress it was my duty to defend the reputation of the knights of my order, but I would not have wagered a clipped farthing on the truth of it. Unlike most of my sisters, I had served on Cyprus before the order’s headquarters was moved to Rhodes and I had seen at first hand the cruelty and arrogance of some of my brother knights, which had given the people of that isle good cause to rise against the Hospitallers, though I would never have breathed as much to a living soul, not even to Clarice.

  The sister’s sharp chin jerked up at my reprimand, and there was the same flash of fury in her dark little eyes as there had been when Nicholas had demanded she surrender the priory’s accounts.

  ‘It is no sin to speak the truth, Prioress,’ she retorted indignantly, ‘and I said no more to Master Rohese than I believe. I was forced to sit with Steward Nicholas, as it pleases him to dub himself now, as he went through my figures, and I can tell you he’d barely glanced at the records before he was claiming a property here had been undervalued or an acre of plough land there should yield twice more than I had recorded. He was accusing me of not checking thoroughly, not that he said it in so many words, but he might as well have done for we both knew what he meant.’

  She snorted furiously, and then the corners of her lips twitched in a faint smile. ‘But Master Rohese is no man’s fool. There are many hidden valleys and oak woods on the moors. I suspect he’ll already be moving some of his cattle and stores to places where a stranger would never find them. Not,’ she added firmly, fixing me with a baleful stare, ‘that I encouraged the tenants to do any such thing, Prioress.’