Read Brother Cadfael 18: The Summer of the Danes for Free Online Page A

said Cadfael candidly, "you will see very good reason why he should boast of it." That coaxed a reluctant smile out of her. He pursued the small success: "What is it between you two? Is it some threat from the new bishop? If he's bent on ridding himself of all the married priests in his diocese he has an uphill row to hoe. And your father seems to me an able man, one a new incumbent can ill afford to lose."
    "So he is," she agreed, warming, "and the bishop wants to keep him. His case would have been much worse, but my mother was in her last illness when Bishop Gilbert arrived, and it seemed she could not last long, so they waited! Can you conceive of it? Waiting for a wife to die, so that he need not part with her husband, who was useful to him! And die she did, last Christmas, and ever since then I have kept his house, cooked and cleaned for him, and thought we could go on so. But no, I am a reminder of a marriage the bishop says was unlawful and sacrilegious. In his eyes I never should have been born! Even if my father remains celibate the rest of his life, I am still here, to call to mind what he wants forgotten. Yes, he, not only the bishop! I stand in the way of his advancement."
    "Surely," said Mark, shocked, "you do him injustice. I am certain he feels a father's affection for you, as I do believe you feel a daughter's for him."
    "It never was tested before," she said simply. "No one grudged us a proper love. Oh, he wishes me no ill, neither does the bishop. But very heartily they both wish that I may go somewhere else to thrive, so far away I shall trouble them no more."
    "So that is why they've planned to match you with a man of Anglesey. As far away," said Cadfael ruefully, "as a man could get and still be in North Wales. Yes, that would certainly settle the bishop's mind. But what of yours? Do you know the man they intend for you?"
    "No, that was the prince's doing, and he meant it kindly, and indeed I take it kindly. No, the bishop wanted to send me away to a convent in England, and make a nun of me. Owain Gwynedd said that would be a wicked waste unless it was my wish, and asked me there in front of everyone in the hall if I had any mind to it, and very loudly and clearly I said no. So he proposed this match for me. His man is looking for a wife, and they tell me he's a fine fellow, not so young but barely past thirty, which is not so old, and good to look at, and well regarded. Better at least," she said without great enthusiasm, "than being shut up behind a grid in an English nunnery."
    "So it is," agreed Cadfael heartily, "unless your own heart drives you there, and I doubt that will ever happen to you. Better, too, surely, than living on here and being made to feel an outcast and a burden. You are not wholly set against marriage?"
    "No!" she said vehemently.
    "And you know of nothing against this man the prince has in mind?"
    "Only that I have not chosen him," she said, and set her red lips in a stubborn line.
    "When you see him you may approve him. It would not be the first time," said Cadfael sagely, "that an intelligent matchmaker got the balance right."
    "Well or ill," she said, rising with a sigh, "I have no choice but to go. My father goes with me to see that I behave, and Canon Morgant, who is as rigid as the bishop himself, goes with us to see that we both behave. Any further scandal now, and goodbye to any advancement under Gilbert. I could destroy him if I so wished," she said, dwelling vengefully on something she knew could never be a possibility, for all her anger and disdain. And from the evening light in the doorway she looked back to add: "I can well live without him. Soon or late, I should have gone to a husband. But do you know what most galls me? That he should give me up so lightly, and be so thankful to get rid of me."
    Canon Meirion came for them as he had promised, just as the bustle in the courtyard was settling into competent quietness, building work abandoned for the day, all the