Willows for Weeping Read online

  Janna leaned closer to see it better. She was willing to wager her life that this, at least, was a fake, for the hair was shining with health and must have been attached to a living head until very recently. Any hair over a thousand years old would long since have crumbled into dust. Unless it really was . . .?

  No! Janna chided herself for being so gullible.

  Ulf's glance slanted sideways to Janna's face and read there her mistrust. He rolled up the linen sheath and swiftly produced another to take its place. 'A tooth from the head of St John the Baptist,' he announced defiantly, scowling at Janna as she gave a gurgle of amusement.

  Golde picked up the tooth and inspected it. 'How much?' she demanded.

  'It's not for sale!' Ulf sounded so shocked that Brutus gave a sharp bark.

  With a swift word of apology, Golde dropped it on the linen pad and hastily retreated.

  'But as it's you, and for an offering . . .?' Ulf amended hurriedly, and held out the sacred object.

  Golde shook her husband awake, and muttered in his ear. Looking surly, he heaved himself upright and fumbled in his scrip for a ha'penny. He ventured forward, keeping a cautious eye on Brutus as he did so, and placed the coin in Ulf's hand. Ulf continued to watch him expectantly. With a sigh, the pilgrim extracted another ha'penny. Ulf drew the linen sheath closer to his chest, a slight movement which Golde correctly interpreted. She gave her husband a sharp dig in the ribs. Reluctantly, he pulled out a farthing, slapped the coins into Ulf's palm and, in one swift movement, scooped up the linen sheath and rolled the tooth safely into it. Golde took it from Morcar and placed the small bundle into her own purse. She smiled at Ulf, well pleased with the deal. And Ulf returned her smile, obviously delighted by a transaction that must have exceeded his greatest expectations.

  'I've saved the best until last,' he said. All the pilgrims were gathered around now, even Adam, although a faint sneer curled his lip as he watched the proceedings. This time Ulf pulled a small, ornately carved box from his scrip. The polished wood shone in the shafts of sunlight, as did the gold clasps that secured the lid.

  Curious in spite of her scepticism, Janna leaned forward to peer inside the box as Ulf opened the lid. The box contained a small and weathered splinter of wood.

  Janna shot an enquiring glance at Ulf. 'Am I amazed yet?' she asked.

  He grinned. 'You should be. This comes from the Holy Rood, the True Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour.'

  A voice cut in swiftly, before Janna had a chance to express her opinion. 'What pri . . . offering would you accept in exchange for that?'

  Ulf turned to face the bidder. It was Juliana, her wrinkled old face eager as she reached out a hand for the box. Ulf hesi-tated, then held it out to her. Janna liked him a little more for his reluctance to hoodwink the old lady as he said, 'You may give me what you will, ma dame, and may God bless you and give strength to your limbs.'

  'You don't want to believe everything Ulf tells you, Mother.' Bernard had come to her side. He tried to take the box from Juliana's grasp, but she hung on fiercely.

  'Mind your own business,' she hissed at him. She tucked the box securely under her armpit, and opened her purse. Bernard's lips tightened, but he kept silent as his mother extracted several silver coins, which she poured into Ulf's palm.

  Janna watched the transaction with interest, impressed by the casual way in which Juliana had handed over what amounted to a small fortune. Even Ulf seemed taken aback, although he accepted the coins willingly enough.

  So Juliana was not impoverished; she could well have afforded the luxury of a mount to carry her to Compostela and back again. Given how painful walking was for her, this must indeed be a journey of true repentance. Janna wondered what such a respectable old lady could have done to warrant such penance. Could she have been caught dealing in stolen goods? Or running a bawdy house? Did she own slaves, which was now against the law? Increasingly bizarre scenarios kept Janna entertained as Ulf secured his pack and put it away. He seemed a little subdued. Janna wondered if he was genuinely fond of the old lady and if there were limits to whom he would cheat.

  With the entertainment over, the pilgrims drifted away. Wordlessly, Ulf handed Janna a wineskin which she declined with thanks, having drunk her fill at the river. 'Was that real, that sliver of wood?' she asked. 'Did it really come from the Holy Rood?'

  'Aye. The monk I bought it from swore that's where it had come from.' Ulf put his wineskin away, stretched out along his cloak and closed his eyes. Janna observed him, thinking he was a likeable rogue, but a rogue nevertheless. Her attention moved to Ulf's dog. 'Hey, Brutus,' she said carefully, and clicked her fingers. The dog eyed her briefly, but growled as she extended her hand for an experimental pat.

  Janna hurriedly withdrew, just in case the dog decided it wanted another tasty morsel to chew. It seemed to have finished off whatever it had carried in its mouth, and now it rested its muzzle on its paws, keeping a wary eye on her. Fragments of bone and bits of gristle lay on the grass nearby, bearing witness to the dog's dinner. Janna espied a fragment larger than the others, and frowned. She was almost sure it wasn't a bone from any animal she knew. She picked it up to study it more carefully. It looked more like a human toe, or perhaps part of a finger. She recalled the hand of St James in its reliquary at the abbey. In its great age it had shrunk to skin and bone so that one could almost see the structure underneath. This bone seemed similar.

  Janna shuddered and threw the bone away. Had the dog got in among Ulf's relics? She glanced sideways at his pack. Was it full of spare body parts? Was that why it was so heavy?

  She sat back with a grimace of distaste, and ruefully surveyed her blistered, bloodied feet. She should wash them and find some soothing herbs to heal the broken skin and dull the pain. Yet it seemed almost too much trouble to move. The heat of the day pressed down on her; her senses were dulled by the still, bright afternoon and the heavy silence, which was punctuated only by the splashing river and the languorous hum of bees. A faint sound of snoring came to her ears: Juliana, sprawled out on her cloak once more, resting her tired old bones. Janna felt her own eyes begin to close.

  She wasn't sure how much time had passed when something jolted her awake. What had disturbed her? She looked about at the peaceful scene.

  The pilgrims were quiet, some resting, some with small books in their hands, some telling the rosary or murmuring quietly to one another. The sound that had disturbed her was growing louder: the urgent thrum of hoof beats that told of a horseman coming their way, and in a great hurry too.

  Someone else had also heard the rider's approach. Winifred had leapt to her feet. Her glance met Janna's and she smiled faintly, yet Janna sensed the effort behind her appearance of calm.

  Janna recognised the badge of the rider's office even before he dismounted and announced himself to their party. 'I was charged by Abbess Hawise to come after you,' he said, scowling at each of them in turn. 'Do not think you can hide from her wrath.'

  'Hide?' Bernard echoed. He spread his hands in bewilderment. 'We came this way to escape a band of horsemen on the road, and we stayed to drink from the river and rest. I can assure you, we are not hiding from the abbess.'

  The guard's lips compressed. His cold eyes told Janna that he did not believe Bernard, nor did he trust any of them. 'The hand of our blessed St James the Apostle was discovered missing from its reliquary this morning,' he told them. 'It seems you hold the key to the relic's disappearance and you will now submit yourselves to my search. You will travel no further unless and until I give you permission to leave.'

  THREE

  ARE YOU ACCUSING us, a group of devout pilgrims, of this vile and blasphemous deed?' There was an angry gleam in Bernard's eyes as he fronted the abbess's messenger.

  The guard held his ground. 'Yes. But you're not the only group under suspicion,' he admitted. 'The abbey and all those who reside there have been searched, and the abbess has sent riders after every group that has departed this day. The
abbess is wrath, not least for fear of what the empress will say when she is told of this crime. The lady entrusted the sacred relic to the abbey for safekeeping. Anyone caught with it in his possession will be severely punished, you may be sure of it.'

  Janna recalled the fragments of bone on the grass, and felt her stomach lurch in horror. She glanced towards Ulf, who seemed unconcerned by their unexpected pursuer. Did he even know what Brutus had done? Moving unobtrusively, Janna edged towards the patch of flattened grass where Brutus, so recently, had eaten his dinner. The scraps of flesh and bone were still visible. She did not dare bend down to examine them but, even scrutinising them from a distance, she felt fairly sure that they had, indeed, once formed part of a whole hand. She looked from Ulf to the guard, then back down at the ground once more, trying to hide her discomfort.

  Should she say something to the guard? She shook her head in answer to her question. Nothing could make the hand whole again. All she would achieve was the imprisonment of Ulf, and she certainly didn't want that on her conscience. And what of the real culprit, who was yet more innocent than his master? She certainly didn't want to take responsibility for a homeless dog! She quickly kicked some loose dirt over the incriminating evidence and walked forward to join the party of pilgrims now clustered around the guard.

  'Much better to tell me now if you know anything of it, for the abbess may be persuaded to clemency if the sacred relic is returned unharmed and without delay.' The guard waited some moments, looking expectantly from one face to the next. But no-one spoke. 'Very well,' he snapped, his disappointment plain for all to see. 'Lay your packs out on the ground. I shall inspect them all, after which I shall search each of you personally. And the garments you wear.' His hard stare moved from pilgrim to pilgrim and came to rest on Janna.

  'No!' she cried, outraged at the prospect of having to undress in front of everyone. She looked about for Winifred to join her protest, and her gaze fell on Juliana.

  'No,' Juliana agreed. ''Tis not seemly for any man to search a woman. However, to serve the abbey's interests, I am prepared to undergo your search. I am no longer of an age where such a thing matters to me. Once you are satisfied that I am innocent, I will undertake to search the women, and their belongings, in private.' She stressed the last two words, making sure that her meaning was plain.

  Janna nodded her thanks. She turned her attention to the guard, hopeful that he would agree to the compromise. To her relief, he said curtly, 'Very well then, old woman. I'll make a start with you.' He took a step towards her, but was interrupted by Bernard, who belatedly introduced himself as the leader of the pilgrim group.

  'This is my mother,' he went on, indicating Juliana. 'On my honour, I will undertake to watch all the other members of our band while you conduct your search privately, behind that thicket of bushes over there. We shall all watch each other.'

  The guard thought it over for a few moments, before murmuring a reluctant agreement. He walked towards the bushy screen, keeping several paces behind Juliana, who stalked ahead of him. Winifred materialised beside Janna, breathing hard. 'Is he going to search us all?' she whispered.

  'Yes.'

  'I have never undressed before a man! And I don't intend to start now!'

  'You don't have to. Juliana offered to prove her innocence first, and she's going to search all the women afterwards.' Janna wondered where Winifred had gone that she hadn't heard what had transpired.

  'Thanks be to God for that!'

  'You should rather thank Juliana for her generosity.' Janna already knew the search would prove futile. Not only that, it was going to waste several hours, hours of daylight when they could be walking on to their destination. She wondered if, after all, she should say something. But how could Brutus have come by the saint's hand in the first place?

  She had no pack to dump, but the rest of the group had dutifully set their packs out in a line, and were now busy watching one another. The guard rejoined them and com-menced his search, pulling everything out of each pack and exposing it to the view of the pilgrims.

  'Careful! There are precious relics in there!' Ulf's shout stopped the guard momentarily. He straightened and scrutinised Ulf.

  'A relic seller, are you?' He bent to Ulf's unwieldy pack and eagerly began to extract bundles wrapped in linen along with a number of small, wooden boxes. The bundles were unrolled, the boxes opened, and the pilgrims crowded round to view the contents: scraps of fabric, teeth, fingers and other body parts, engraved stone runes, several precious gems. To the obvious disappointment of the guard, there was no hand among them. Ulf growled in protest at seeing his treasures thus exposed, and his dog growled louder, but there was little Ulf could do to prevent the search. The guard, visibly annoyed, moved on with his search, leaving Ulf to secure his precious relics and return them to his pack.

  Juliana flounced out from the concealing bushes, red-faced and discomforted. She beckoned Janna to come to her. Once Janna had stripped, Juliana insisted on viewing the contents of the purse she kept hidden under her gown. The old woman's eyes widened as she swiftly calculated the value of the silver coins Janna carried, and grew ever wider as she noticed the brooch, ring and letter also secreted there.

  She reached out a hand to pick them up for a more careful inspection, but Janna swept them back into her purse, deter-mined that Juliana would not learn her mother's secrets. Instead, she showed her the last treasure from her purse: a small statue of a mother tenderly clasping a child. 'Look, I found this out in the forest near where I used to live,' she said.

  Juliana drew back with a sudden hiss. 'Why do you carry a pagan idol?'

  'It's the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus,' Janna contradicted sharply. She had no way of knowing it was any such thing, but Juliana's ready condemnation annoyed her. She closed her fingers around the small statue and thrust it back into her purse. 'And what did you mean when you said that death was following me?' she demanded. 'Am I going to die?' She hastily donned her under-tunic, then pulled the silky blue gown over her head.

  'We are all going to die. That's what people do.' Juliana turned away. 'Send Winifred to me,' she instructed.

  Janna told herself that Juliana must be senile to say such things, yet she couldn't help feeling uneasy. But it was clear she'd get nothing more out of the old woman and so she hurried off to fetch Winifred, securing the gauzy veil over her hair as she went.

  The search of the packs was over. At Bernard's suggestion, the guard turned his attention to the dead man. Not that Bernard would have left anything incriminating for the guard to find, Janna thought, remembering how thoroughly the pilgrim had searched the body. But she had to admit she couldn't see Bernard covering up something so serious as the theft of the hand of St James. She watched carefully as the guard quickly examined the dead man's pack and scrip, wearing an expression of extreme distaste as he did so. Clearly relieved to be done, he shoved everything back where he'd found it and hastily moved away. Seemingly there was nothing there to interest him.

  Janna wondered what had happened to the packet of parch-ment. Had Bernard secreted it somewhere about his person? Would he show it to the guard? There was no way of finding out for, taking his cue from Juliana and perhaps mindful of the sensibilities of the other women of the party, the guard now banished them all behind the bushy screen to wait while the men of the party were stripped and searched.

  Janna decided to pass the time by fashioning a staff for herself. She began to explore the area, looking for something that might prove suitable.

  'What are you doing?' Winifred bounded up to Janna. 'What are you looking for?'

  Her aggrieved expression relaxed somewhat as Janna explained her mission. She began to hunt about for a long, straight stick for her own use. 'The guard's wasting his time – and ours. He's not going to find the hand among a group of pilgrims, is he?' she commented, as she pressed her foot down on a fallen tree and hauled back on a dead branch until it cracked under the pressure.

  Janna thought of Br
utus. 'No, I don't think he'll have any success here.' Abandoning her search among the debris along the river bank, she pulled out her knife and carefully sawed off a length of hawthorn from a living tree.

  'I think it was the dead man who stole the hand.' Winifred stopped to watch as Janna began to trim her new staff, slicing off small twigs and leaves.

  'No, it wasn't.'

  'Even if the guard didn't find it on his body, it could be that the man had an accomplice. Maybe he gave it to someone else for safekeeping before he died?'

  'He didn't take it. He's been dead far longer than it's been missing.'

  'Then the hand will never be found!' Winifred looked sideways at Janna. She seemed to be plucking up courage to say something. 'All those relics in Master Ulf's pack. Do you think they're really what he says they are?' she blurted out.

  Janna laughed. 'I suspect not. But I couldn't say for sure,' she added, wanting to give the rogue the benefit of the doubt.

  'But the hand of St James the apostle? That's real, isn't it?'

  Janna shrugged. 'I was at the abbey when the Empress Matilda visited us and handed it over. There was a special mass said for it. The abbess certainly believes it is a true relic. There wouldn't be all this fuss otherwise.'

  Winifred breathed a small sigh. 'That's all right, then.'

  Janna raised a questioning eyebrow, waiting for her young companion to explain herself. But Winifred began to pace restlessly among the trees as if anxious to be gone.

  The sun was slanting across the downs from a reddening sky, their figures casting long shadows by the time the guard had finished his search. As Janna had suspected, no unat-tached hand had come to light. Nothing had been achieved in a wasted afternoon, save that the guard had undertaken to lead the horse and its dead rider back to Wiltune and instigate a search as to the man's identity, so that his family might be notified and the body decently buried. Master Bernard thanked him heartily for the offer, obviously relieved to hand over the duty and burden of care.