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for the plea would fail of
itself when the pleader failed to appear.
    It
came as a shattering shock when a sudden stir at the door, prompt to the hour
appointed, blew into the hall a small, round, unimpressive person in the
Benedictine habit, hugging to him an armful of vellum rolls, and followed by
his black-gowned brothers in close attendance. Cadfael, too, was observing him
with interest, for it was the first time he had seen him clearly. A modest man
of comfortable figure and amiable countenance, rosy and mild. Not so old as
that night journey had suggested, perhaps forty-five, with a shining innocence
about him. But to Roger Mauduit it might have been a fire-breathing dragon
entering the hall.
    And
who would have expected, from that gentle, even deprecating presence, the
clarity and expertise with which that small man deployed his original charter,
punctiliously identical to Roger’s, according to the account Alard had given,
and omitting any specific mention of what should follow Arnulf Mauduit’s death,
how scrupulously he pointed out the omission and the arguments to which it
might give rise, and followed it up with two letters written by that same
Arnulf Mauduit to Abbot Fulchered, referring in plain terms to the obligatory
return of the manor and village after his death, and pledging his son’s loyal
observance of the obligation.
    It
might have been want of proofs that caused Roger to make so poor a job of
refuting the evidence, or it might have been craven conscience. Whatever the
cause, judgement was given for the abbey.
    Cadfael
presented himself before the lord he was leaving barely an hour after the
verdict was given.
    “My
lord, your suit is concluded, and my service with it. I have done what I
pledged, here I part from you.”
    Roger
sat sunk in gloom and rage, and lifted upon him a glare that should have felled
him, but failed of its impact.
    “I
misdoubt me,” said Roger, smouldering, “how you have observed your loyalty to
me. Who else could know...” He bit his tongue in time, for as long as it
remained unsaid no accusation had been made, and no rebuttal was needed. He
would have liked to ask: How did you know? But he thought better of it. “Go,
then, if you have nothing more to say.”
    “As
to that,” said Cadfael meaningly, “nothing more need be said. It’s over.” And
that was recognisable as a promise, but with uneasy implications, for plainly
on some other matter he still had a thing to say.
    “My
lord, give some thought to this, for I was until now in your service, and wish
you no harm. Of those four who attended Prior Heribert on his way here, not one
carried arms. There was neither sword nor dagger nor knife of any kind among
the five of them.”
    He
saw the significance of that go home, slowly but with bitter force. The
masterless men had been nothing but a children’s tale, but until now Roger had
thought, as he had been meant to think, that that dagger-stroke in the forest
had been a bold attempt by an abbey servant to defend his prior. He blinked and
swallowed and stared, and began to sweat, beholding a perilous gulf into which
he had all but stumbled.
    “There
were none there who bore arms,” said Cadfael, “but your own.”
    A
double-edged ambush that had been, to have him out in the forest by night, all
unsuspecting. And there were as many miles between Woodstock and Sutton Mauduit
returning as coming, and there would be other nights as dark on the way.
    “Who?”
asked Roger in a grating whisper. “Which of them? Give him a name!”
    “No,”
said Cadfael simply. “Do your own divining. I am no longer in your service, I
have said all I mean to say.”
    Roger’s
face had turned grey. He was hearing again the plan unfolded so seductively in
his ear. “You cannot leave me so! If you know so much, for God’s sake return
with me, see me safely home, at least. You I could trust!”
    “No,”
said Cadfael again.