Holy Thief by Ellis Peters

essence of her certainly can,” said Cadfael, “for she has done miracles here
among us. She lay in that coffin three days, why should she not have conferred
the power of her grace upon it? Is she to be limited by time and place? I tell
you, Hugh, sometimes I wonder what would be found within there, if ever that
lid was lifted. Though I own,” he added ruefully, “I shall be praying devoutly
that it never comes to the proof.”
    “You
had better,” Hugh agreed. “Imagine the uproar, if someone somewhere breaks
those seals you repaired so neatly, and prizes off the lid, to find the body of
a young man about twenty-four, instead of the bones of a virgin saint. And
mother-naked, at that! Your goose would be finely cooked!” He rose, laughing,
but even so a little wryly, for the possibility certainly existed, and might
yet erupt into disaster. “I must go and make ready. Prior Robert means to set
out as soon as he has dined.” He embraced Cadfael briskly about the shoulders
in passing, by way of encouragement, and shook him bracingly. “Never fear, you
are a favourite with her, and she’ll look after her own, let alone that you’ve
managed very well so far at looking after yourself.”
    “The
strange thing is, Hugh,” Cadfael said suddenly, as Hugh reached the door, “that
I’m concerned almost as anxiously for poor Columbanus.”
    “Poor
Columbanus?” Hugh echoed, turning to stare back at him in astonished amusement.
“Cadfael, you never cease to surprise me. Poor Columbanus, indeed! A murderer
by stealth, and all for his own glory, not for Shrewsbury’s, and certainly not
for Winifred’s.”
    “I
know! But he ended the loser. And dead! And now, flooded out of what rest was
allowed him on a quiet altar here at home, taken away to some strange place
where he knows no one, friend or enemy. And perhaps,” said Cadfael, shaking his
head over the strayed sinner, “having miracles expected of him, when he can do
none. It would not be so hard to feel a little sorry for him.”
     
    Cadfael
went up to Longner as soon as the midday meal was over, and found the young
lord of the manor in his smithy within the stockade, himself supervising the
forging of a new iron tip for a ploughshare. Eudo Blount was a husbandman born,
a big, candid, fair fellow, to all appearances better built for service in arms
than his younger brother, but a man for whom soil, and crops and wellkept
livestock would always be fulfilment enough. He would raise sons in his own
image, and the earth would be glad of them. Younger sons must carve out their
own fortunes. “Lost Saint Winifred?” said Eudo, gaping, when he heard the
purport of Cadfael’s errand. “How the devil could you lose her? Not a thing to
be palmed and slipped in a pouch when no one’s looking. And you want speech
with Gregory and Lambert? Surely you don’t suppose they’d have any use for her,
even if they did have a cart on the Horse Fair! There’s no complaint of my men
down there, is there?”
    “None
in the world!” said Cadfael heartily. “But just by chance, they may have seen
something the rest of us were blind enough to miss. They lent a hand when there
was need of it, and we were heartily thankful. But no use looking further
afield until we’ve looked close at home, and made sure no over-zealous idiot
has put the lady away somewhere safely and mislaid her. We’ve asked of every
soul within the walls, better consult these last two, or we might stop short of
the simple answer.”
    “Ask
whatever you will,” said Eudo simply. “You’ll find them both across in the stable
or the carthouse. And I wish you might get your easy answer, but I doubt it.
They hauled the wood down there, and loaded it, and came home, and I recall
Gregory did tell me what was going on in the church, and how high the water was
come in the nave. But nothing besides. But try him!”
    Secure
among his own people, Eudo felt no need