CHAPTER XXIIA red, wintry dawn was in the east when Denise stood ready for her flight from the Abbey lands, her rabbit-skin cloak about her, and the hood drawn over her head. She had knotted the money that Reginald had given her into a corner of her under tunic, and the food that she had saved from yesterday she carried wrapped in a clean cloth. Denise had thought of seeking Grimbald, but her heart had failed her at the thought of meeting the familiar faces of the people who had looked upon her as something superhumanly pure and wonderful. The passion that obsessed her for the moment was the passion to escape from the inquisitive eyes of those who knew her, and to slip away into the world where she would be nothing more than a mere woman.
A robin twittered on the thorn hedge as she left t
