The Brothers of Glastonbury by Kate Sedley Page B

It is the tradition in his family, he told me, that this paper was taken to Ireland by one of his remote forebears who came from hereabouts.’
    ‘And did he understand its message?’
    Father Boniface spoke slowly, as one dealing with a simpleton or a child. ‘I have already explained that when it was given into my keeping I had no notion what the paper contained. When Gerald returned from Canterbury he could share the secret of its contents with me or not, just as he pleased. But as you have surmised he did not return, and a little over three months ago I learned that he had died shortly after he had fulfilled his lifelong vow to worship at the Holy Martyr’s tomb. A fellow pilgrim who had been with him at the end, and who was on his way home to Wales, told me that Gerald had been buried in Canterbury.’
    ‘So you opened the paper?’ I was not condemning Father Boniface, which he seemed to understand; I should have done the same in his place, as, I think, would anyone.
    ‘I did, and have told you what I found. Of course I could make no sense of its message, and so, a little while afterwards, when Peter Gildersleeve brought me a fresh supply of parchments, I gave it to him to see if he could puzzle out its meaning.’
    ‘And you have no idea whether he did so or not?’
    ‘When I last saw him, four or five weeks since, he said he thought he might have some news for me very soon.’ The priest’s face grew deeply troubled. ‘And now I understand that the poor young man has disappeared in mysterious circumstances.’ He shivered again, more violently than before, and his hand, when he laid it on mine, was icy cold in spite of the heat. ‘I fear I might unwittingly have enmeshed him in some terrible evil. I did not know until this morning, when Mark Gildersleeve came to visit me, what had happened. We are isolated here. News takes a day or two to reach us.’
    I scratched my chin, where tomorrow’s growth of beard was already making its presence felt. When, I wondered, had Mark discovered this paper? He had not known of it last night, or he would not have asked me to carry out my search this morning. So, sometime between then and now he must have chanced upon it.
    ‘Do you suppose,’ I enquired of Father Boniface, ‘that Mark also associated this strange message, whatever it may be, with his brother’s disappearance?’
    ‘It is possible, my son.’
    ‘Did he have the paper with him?’
    ‘I asked him that. I thought that perhaps we might have studied it together in the vain hope of finding some clue to its meaning, but Mark said no, he had left it at home.’
    ‘Did he know its history?’
    ‘No, for his brother had never spoken to him about it. I gathered from his discourse that he does not share Master Peter’s interest in antiquities.’
    ‘That’s true enough.’ I frowned as a thought occurred to me. ‘But if, as you say, his brother neither showed him this paper nor discussed it with him, how did Mark know that it had been given to Peter by you?’
    The priest nodded sagely. ‘That question also occurred to me. It would seem that my name had been written on the reverse side of the parchment by his brother.’
    Of course! I had seen similar annotations on the books and folios I had looked at that morning; names written either at the beginning or at the end of the script which, then, had had no meaning for me. Now I understood. They were the names of the people from whom Peter had acquired them.
    I turned to Cicely, only to find that she was not attending to the conversation. She had been busy picking the daisies which surrounded her and fashioning them into garlands. She had a chain about each wrist and a third, longer one, perched on her curls like a flowery coronet, but slipping towards her left ear, which gave her a slightly rakish appearance. I realized that, in spite of her airs and graces, she had not really grown up yet, which gave her the childlike ability to detach herself from time to