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knees with paternosters enough to take your mind off anything else!”
    Dame Perpetua sat.
    Frevisse, as hosteler, was last to be called on. Eyes down, she stood up and said, “The guest halls are presently full and no one is expected to depart today. There is presently food and drink enough for them. There are no complaints to be made against anyone or about anything.”
    She stopped, forbearing to add that if any travelers came now, asking the priory’s hospitality, there would be no place to put them, thanks to all the Godfreys presently there, and that as things were going, by Christmas there would be nothing to feed them either, whether there was room for them by then or not.
    Domina Alys gave her a sharp nod. “Good. Sit.” She looked around at all of them. “Is there aught else?”
    Her tone indicated there had best not be. Sister Amicia and Sister Emma squirmed a little, Sister Cecely exchanged a glance with Sister Johane, but no one said anything.
    “Good. Then we’ll see to the matter of this girl.”
    Heads came up alertly among the nuns, and not merely the four youngest. Domina Alys gave no sign of noticing it.
    “Dame Frevisse, you dealt with her yesterday. Who is she? What have you learned about her?”
    “She’s Joice Southgate. Her father is a draper of Northampton.”
    “What was she doing in Banbury, then?” Domina Alys demanded.
    Not waiting to be carried off to marry a Godfrey, Frevisse held back from answering as curtly; but Domina Alys had wanted no answer, was demanding, “Is his father as rich as Sir Reynold says?”
    “I gather so. She says he’s in partnership with someone in London.”
    Domina Alys nodded satisfaction with that. “She’s content enough in Lady Eleanor’s keeping?”
    “When I left her yesterday, yes,” Frevisse said.
    “She’s not going to make trouble?”
    Frevisse forbore from asking, In what way? Joice’s refusal to marry Benet was trouble in itself and she certainly meant to go on making it. But that was something else Domina Alys did not want to hear, so Frevisse merely said, “She’s content to be in Lady Eleanor’s keeping. She understands she should not try to leave.”
    “Best she keeps that understanding, too,” Domina Alys said. “Now, all of you heed me on this. Young Benet Godfrey is going to be coming and going in and out of the cloister this next day or two or so.”
    Heads lifted again, with alarm or wariness or open interest. Several mouths opened, but Domina Alys cut off anything that might have been said with, “There’s no discussion of this. I don’t want to hear a thing about it”
    “Oh! But…” Sister Cecely began.
    Domina Alys turned on her fiercely. “I said I wanted to hear nothing! Two hundred aves lying on your face before the altar and you’ll fast until you’ve finished with them, however long it takes you.”
    Sister Cecely visibly paled and shrank inside her habit. There would be no question of shirking her other duties because of the punishment. The aves would have to be fitted into what little free time there was in a day, and she might go hungry until tomorrow because of them.
    Domina Alys raked the rest of them with an angry stare. “Anyone else?”
    Sister Amicia’s open mouth snapped shut. Sister Emma pressed her hands to her own mouth to be sure no word escaped her. When no one else made any move at all, not even so much as a shake of a head, Domina Alys drew a deep breath and said, “Then I’ll say this once and that’s all I’d better have to say it. Young Benet will be coming in to see this Joice Southgate, in hopes he can persuade her to marry him. He’ll see her in Lady Eleanor’s room, with Lady Eleanor to watch. He’ll come and go as seems best to him and Lady Eleanor, and you’re none of you to take note of him or be in his way or find reason to speak to him or about this to anyone, even among yourselves. Do you all understand that?”
    No one dared raise any question or objection or even