“Thank you, Sister.” Theodosia shot Benedict a victorious glance and led the way inside.
♦ ♦ ♦
Hat in hand, Palmer walked behind Theodosia as the Polesworth sister led them through the gatehouse and down a lengthy stone-flagged passageway that was open to the sky. The nun’s age and limp meant they had to walk slowly. No mind. He’d never been in these private places before, and it was like another world.
He’d expected silence, and had a childish picture in his head of rows of praying nuns, eyes aloft. He couldn’t have been more wrong.
A cheery nun hurried past, arms piled high with clean linen.
“One of our infirmary sisters,” said the nun to Theodosia. “We are very proud of our healing here.”
The anchoress nodded. “Healing for the body as well as the soul.”
With her head bowed and hands linked, she matched the set of the old nun. Her voice too: low, barely above a murmur. Like the thin, dried snakeskins he used to find on compost heaps as a boy, she’d cast off her worldly self at the gate. The change didn’t suit her. He’d become used to her gray eyes raised and challenging, her tread as definite as his. No mind again. This was her world, where she belonged. He’d pulled her from it, and it was right he delivered her back. He should be glad to be rid of her, with her chiding of him, her arguing, her foolhardiness. But he wasn’t. For he also lost her bravery, her loyalty. She turned to the old nun again, and he caught the curve of her cheek, her pale, fine skin. Her beauty too.
Keen to turn his heavy thoughts aside, he looked to where an anvil rang steady under a hammer. Through a series of archways, the forge was in full use, with the glow of piled embers and the smell of hot iron. Nothing unusual, except a gaunt, tall sister worked it. Her face shone with sweat, and her sleeves were rolled up and secured in linen bands. Her powerful hammer blows looked expert to his eye.
“I’m surprised you have no lay brothers to perform such heavy tasks,” said Theodosia.
The nun tutted. “No lay brothers here. No brothers at all. Nothing they can do that we can’t.”
The smell of freshly baked bread wafted from a side building across a small courtyard and called to Palmer’s stomach.
“A bakery as well? You must have no time for praying.” He said it as a jest, trying to raise his spirits.
Theodosia shot him her fierce look of old. He smiled inside. Maybe she wasn’t quite lost to the world yet.
The old nun pretended she hadn’t heard him. Instead, she pointed to a broad, high doorway far at the end of the corridor, its carved-wood double doors closed tight. “The cloisters are through there,” she said to Theodosia. “Private, of course. The Abbess’s lodge is on the next floor.”
He walked behind them to where a stone vestibule led off the corridor. Yet another sister swept the floor hard with a broom of long twigs. She made room for them to pass, then went back to her task with the same vigor.
Their guide led them up a stone stairwell, which ended on a small landing. An iron-hinged oak door, aged by time and use, stood open.
“Please make yourselves comfortable. I will fetch the Abbess,” said the nun.
“Bless you, Sister,” said Theodosia. She led the way into the room, Palmer close behind.
The oak floor shone from beeswax and many hours of polishing. Arranged around an inlaid pale wood table were straight-backed chairs with fine-turned legs and decorated with painted green bands. Each chair had a gold velvet cushion and a tapestry footstool. A folding table with a sloped desktop stood in the huge leaded window, the better to catch the light. Painted wood panels covered the walls, each a scene from the Bible in costly colors and gold leaf. A stone fireplace threw out heat from a couple of large logs. No wonder Theodosia was so keen to get back to this life.
“I see the Abbess likes her comforts,” he said dryly.
“This room is to help her serve the Lord.” Theodosia went to stand before the fire and rubbed her hands. “Not for comfort.”
Palmer didn’t reply as he joined her at the welcome warmth. Religious folk had a different view on comfort, it seemed.
“Oh, where can she be?” Theodosia’s impatient question was to the flames, with no mind to him.
Rapid footsteps sounded on the stairs.
Palmer and Theodosia turned from the hearth as a small, slight woman walked in, dressed in the familiar black robes and white wimple. He guessed she was of advanced years, but she had a keen, sharp look and moved like a much younger woman.
“May God be with you.” She nodded first to Theodosia, who dropped in a deep curtsey, then Palmer. “I am Mother Ursula, the Abbess of Polesworth. I believe you wanted to speak to me, mistress…?”