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porch of the church, and then abandoned him for a more
immediate duty. These people are, after all, responsible for themselves, and
none of his business.
    Not
yet!

 
     
     
    Chapter
Two
     
    IT
WAS NEARING MID-DECEMBER before the dour manservant Aelfric came again to the
herb-gardens for kitchen herbs for his mistress. By that time he was a figure
familiar enough to fade into the daily pattern of comings and goings about the
great court, and among the multifarious noise and traffic his solitary silence
remained generally unremarked. Cadfael had seen him in the mornings, passing
through to the bakery and buttery for the day’s loaves and measures of ale,
always mute, always purposeful, quick of step and withdrawn of countenance, as
though any delay on his part might bring penance, as perhaps, indeed, it might.
Brother Mark, attracted to a soul seemingly as lonely and anxious as his own
had once been, had made some attempt to engage the stranger in talk, and had
little success.
    “Though
he does unfold a little,” said Mark thoughtfully, kicking his heels on the
bench in Cadfael’s workshop as he stirred a salve. “I don’t think he’s an
unfriendly soul at all, if he had not something on his mind. When I greet him
he sometimes comes near to smiling, but he’ll never linger and talk.”
    “He
has his work to do, and perhaps a master who’s hard to please,” said Cadfael
mildly.
    “I
heard he’s out of sorts since they moved in,” said Mark.“The
master, I mean. Not really ill, but low and out of appetite.”
    “So
might I be,” opined Cadfael, “if I had nothing to do but sit there and mope,
and wonder if I’d done well to part with my lands, even in old age. What seems
an easy life in contemplation can be hard enough when it comes to reality.”
    “The
girl,” said Mark judiciously, “is pretty. Have you seen her?”
    “I
have not. And you, my lad, should be averting your eyes from contemplation of
women. Pretty, is she?”
    “Very
pretty. Not very tall, round and fair, with a lot of yellow hair, and black
eyes. It makes a great effect, yellow hair and black eyes. I saw her come to
the stable with some message for Aelfric yesterday. He looked after her, when
she went, in such a curious way. Perhaps she is his trouble.”
    And
that might well be, thought Cadfael, if he was a villein, and she a free woman,
and unlikely to look so low as a serf, and they were rubbing shoulders about
the household day after day, in closer quarters here than about the manor of
Mallilie.
    “She
could as well be trouble for you, boy, if Brother Jerome or Prior Robert sees
you conning her,” he said briskly. “If you must admire a fine girl, let it be
out of the corner of your eyes. Don’t forget we have a reforming rule here
now.”
    “Oh,
I’m careful!” Mark was by no means in awe of Brother Cadfael now, and had
adopted from him somewhat unorthodox notions of what was and was not
permissible. In any case, this boy’s vocation was no longer in doubt or danger.
If the times had been less troublesome he might well have sought leave to go
and study in Oxford, but even without that opportunity, Cadfael was reasonably
certain he would end by taking orders, and become a priest, and a good priest,
too, one aware that women existed in the world, and respectful towards their
presence and their worth. Mark had come unwillingly and resisting into the
cloister, but he had found his rightful place. Not everyone was so fortunate.
    Aelfric
came to the hut in the afternoon of a cloudy day, to ask for some dried mint.
“My mistress wants to brew a mint cordial for my master.”
    “I
hear he’s somewhat out of humour and health,” said Cadfael, rustling the linen
bags that gave forth such rich, heady scents upon the air. The young man’s
nostrils quivered and widened with pleasure, inhaling close sweetness. In the
soft light within, his wary face eased a