Death of a Scholar (36 page)

‘We shall bury all three today, and to Hell with waiting for Sunday. After all, we do not want anyone else to poke at them for ghoulish curiosity. It would be sacrilege, a crime I abhor with all my heart.’

‘Oh,’ said Bartholomew guiltily. ‘Do you?’

All was bustle and flurry as preparations were made for interring the three dead men. Olivia Knyt was summoned, the gravedigger ordered to ready the holes he had dug, and a vicar hired. The priest was Heyford, ever eager for extra fees. He arrived with one hand to his stomach.

‘I was poisoned last night,’ he told Michael and Bartholomew. ‘I lay deadly sick until dawn, but God saw my suffering and I am now on the mend. Doubtless Potmoor would have preferred to incinerate me, but he dares not try that again. Did I tell you that the villain he engaged for that evil deed was not Fulbut at all, but someone from Winwick Hall?’

‘No,’ replied Michael, eyeing him warily. ‘How have you reached that conclusion?’

‘One of my parishioners saw a man racing away from St Clement’s shortly before the alarm was raised, and followed him to that Devil’s foundation. The scoundrel was in disguise, of course, so my parishioner could not tell which of these rogues is the culprit.’

‘Yet you come to bury their dead?’

Heyford sniffed. ‘I am prepared to overlook the connection for a shilling a corpse. Besides, I doubt they will attack me in St Mary the Great – not with you looking on.’

The vicar’s tale reminded Bartholomew of something he had all but forgotten. Moments before he had seen the smoke issuing from St Clement’s, a man in green had almost knocked him over. It had not occurred to him that it might have been the arsonist, especially once Fulbut had been mooted as the culprit.

‘What was he wearing?’ he asked.

‘A grass-coloured cloak,’ replied Heyford. ‘Why? Did you see him, too, and decide to keep the matter to yourself because it shows your accursed University in a bad light?’

‘How could he have seen anyone?’ asked Michael sharply. ‘He was too busy saving your life. And why have you waited until now to tell us what this witness saw?’

‘Because I have only just heard it myself. It came from Verius, who is never very forthcoming with the authorities. However, I shall expect you to investigate Winwick, and bring the villain to justice. I always said there was something diabolical about that College, and I was right!’

‘Has Heyford been poisoned, Matt?’ asked Michael, when the priest had gone to robe himself for his sombre duties.

‘Not with
dormirella
. No one recovers from that once it has been ingested.’ Then Bartholomew told him about the collision outside St Clement’s.

Michael was thoughtful. ‘I wonder which Winwick Fellow owns green clothes. Illesy, who will know all about murder after working for Potmoor? The sweetly smiling Lawrence with his Oxford connections? The sinister Nerli?’

‘Well, it was not Bon, as the man I saw was too tall. Of course, it could have been Holm.’

‘Holm?’ echoed Michael, startled. ‘Why would he run to Winwick?’

‘Because it is full of guildsmen who would give him sanctuary.’ Bartholomew was silent for a moment, thinking. ‘It is odd how everything revolves around that College: two of its scholars suffer premature deaths, it is largely responsible for the matriculand trouble, its Fellows possess the necessary ingredients for
dormirella
, and now the St Clement’s arsonist flees there.’

‘It is not odd, Matt,’ averred Michael. ‘It is downright suspicious.’

Bartholomew heaved a sigh of relief when Knyt, Elvesmere and Ratclyf were in the ground and the evidence of his handiwork was safely concealed. Langelee was relieved, too, because the hasty burial meant that Michaelhouse could not be expected to provide a reciprocal feast. When the last spadeful of earth was being patted down, Bartholomew went with Michael to talk to Verius. The ditcher was at home, regaling his wife with a romantic ballad. Again, Bartholomew was astounded that such a pure, clear voice should emanate from such a loutish individual.

‘Heyford told you?’ asked Verius crossly, when he heard why the two scholars had come. ‘I knew I should have kept it to myself. Now Potmoor will hear, and come to rail at me.’

‘It was Potmoor who set the church alight?’ asked Michael.

‘No, it was someone from Winwick Hall, but I imagine Potmoor hired him.’ Verius played nervously with the bandage on his thumb. ‘I was in the church at the time, hiding from a man I owe money to. I saw a rogue in a green cloak lurk in the shadows until Heyford was drunk, then step forward and set the altar cloth alight.’

‘And you followed the culprit to Winwick Hall?’ asked Michael.

Verius nodded. ‘Because I assumed Heyford would smell the smoke, and get up to douse the flames. I did not think
one
jug of ale would send him to sleep. He is a feeble—’

‘Winwick,’ prompted Bartholomew.

‘The man in the cloak walked in there with all the confidence of Satan, so it was clearly his home. The cloak had black edges, and the hood was up, which means I never saw his face. He was of average height and build, though, so it might have been any of that rabble.’

‘Not any of them,’ countered Ylaria. ‘It could not have been that horrible Uyten, because he is tall and brawny. And it could not have been Ratclyf or Bon, because they are small.’

‘True,’ nodded Verius. ‘You can eliminate them from your enquiries, Brother.’

‘Good,’ said Michael flatly. ‘That only leaves the Provost, two Fellows, sixty students and three dozen servants. Solving the riddle will be simplicity itself.’

The following day was Sunday, when there was an extended Mass and a better breakfast. It was egg mash – eggs cooked with smoked pork – and although there was less meat than usual, the food was at least palatable. Afterwards, Bartholomew and Michael set off to Winwick, to ask who had a green cloak with black edging. Needless to say, no one admitted to owning such a garment, and Illesy procrastinated for so long before allowing a search that the guilty party would have had ample time to dispose of it. Michael looked anyway, just to make a nuisance of himself.

‘This is a fire hazard,’ he declared, when they came to the dormitory above the hall. ‘There must be sixty students in here. It was never intended to hold so many.’

‘Seventy-three,’ corrected Illesy smugly. ‘And our lads love it up here. It is new, clean and affords excellent views of the town.’

Bartholomew did not think it was clean – it reeked of sweaty feet – while the views were obscured by the clothes that had been left hanging over the window shutters.

‘We shall tidy it up before the founder arrives,’ said Lawrence, reading his thoughts. ‘Word is that he has already left London, and is on his way. He must be very excited.’

‘Are you sure it was wise to invite him?’ asked Michael. ‘He will learn that his College is unpopular with the rest of the University and the town, and I cannot see that pleasing him.’

‘He does not care what people think,’ said Illesy. ‘If he did, he would not have grown so rich and powerful. Or accepted so many lucrative posts in the Church – a dozen canonries and seven rectories, at the last count.’

‘A shameless pluralist,’ muttered Michael to Bartholomew, as they walked back down the stairs. ‘I shall abolish the practice when I am Archbishop of Canterbury.’

Bartholomew smothered a smile. ‘And when will that be, Brother?’

‘As soon as the University can manage without me,’ replied the monk. ‘Which it is unable to do at the moment, so do not fear my departure just yet.’

Bartholomew trailed after him as he looked in the
parlura
, hall and library, but was glad when the invitation to inspect the Fellows’ quarters and the Provost’s Suite was declined – the point had been made, and anything more would be a waste of their time. Michael did, however, inveigle an invitation to Winwick’s mid-morning repast, where he tried every ruse he knew to catch the Fellows out in an indiscretion, but they were lawyers and his efforts to trick them were futile. Eventually, he was forced to concede defeat, and he and Bartholomew took their leave.

‘We have two days before term starts,’ he said, once they were outside. ‘Two days! And we are no closer to the truth now than we were when all this started. Indeed, our position is worse, because we have more victims to investigate. Moreover, we have William’s tract hanging over our heads like the Sword of Damocles, and we have done nothing to retrieve our hutch.’

Bartholomew had no words to comfort him. The monk stalked off towards St Mary the Great, where he was needed for decisions about the beginning of term ceremony, after which he would hold another choir practice, while Bartholomew, still plagued with nervous thoughts about dissection, sought comfort in the familiar round of tending patients. There were a lot of them, and they kept him busy well into the afternoon.

All were eager to regale him with rumours about the agitated state of the town, and he grew increasingly alarmed by the sour atmosphere on the streets. Thus he was uncharacteristically sharp when Warden Shropham stopped him to say that Potmoor had broken into King’s Hall on Thursday.

‘How do you
know
Potmoor was the culprit?’ he demanded. ‘Did you see him?’

‘I did not need to see him,’ replied Shropham, taken aback by the angry response. ‘What other criminal would be so audacious?’

‘You say a pewter jug was stolen,’ Bartholomew went on. ‘But I imagine a felon of his eminence would have selected something rather more valuable.’

‘He was disturbed before he had the chance to look around,’ Shropham flashed back. ‘He was obliged to make such a speedy escape that he cut himself on a window, and left splashes of his nasty blood on our nice wood floor. Let us hope it hurts, because it is the only punishment he will ever suffer – de Stannell will not move against a fellow guildsman, and Michael is too busy.’

Bartholomew stared at him. ‘The culprit is injured? Why did you not say so? It means that Michael can look for a gash on Potmoor and ask how it happened.’

‘Potmoor will lie – say he cut himself shaving or some such nonsense. But something should be done, because he becomes more powerful and dangerous with every passing day. Indeed, I imagine he is behind these murders, too. Felbrigge, Elvesmere, Ratclyf and Knyt.’

‘And Hemmysby,’ said Bartholomew unhappily.

Shropham softened. ‘I am more sorry than I can say about him. He was a good man. Forgive my insensitivity, Bartholomew. I am in a bad mood, because I have just heard that Winwick has almost matched us in numbers. And by the beginning of term, it may even be bigger.’

‘Does that matter? There are students enough for both.’

‘It is the principle of the thing. We have always been the largest, and it is not right for this upstart foundation to come along and usurp our place in a matter of days. Moreover, it is
our
prerogative to have first pick of the wealthiest and most influential applicants, but Winwick is poaching them from right under our noses.’

‘I hope you will not fight,’ said Bartholomew anxiously. King’s Hall was jealous of its rights and privileges, and loved nothing more than to defend them with a show of arms.

‘I shall try to prevent it, but Winwick tries our patience sorely.’

Bartholomew watched him walk away, then his attention was caught by a group of matriculands, who were throwing stones at a butcher’s cart. The town boys reacted with fury, and there was an ugly mêlée until Marjory Starre hurled a bucket of slops over them all. The combatants flew apart with cries of disgust. When two outraged matriculands stalked towards her, Bartholomew hastened to intervene. There was a moment when he thought they would fight him, but several members of the Michaelhouse Choir came to stand next to him, and the matriculands beat a hasty retreat. Marjory began to chortle.

‘I have been standing here for ages, waiting for an opportunity to lob. The Devil himself could not have aimed better. Did you see their faces?’

‘Yes,’ said Bartholomew soberly. ‘And you should not do it again. They might hurt you.’

‘Nonsense,’ she declared. ‘They would not dare. And it was good to strike the first blow, for they will be the ones to cause trouble on Tuesday, you mark my words.’

‘At the beginning of term ceremony?’

She nodded. ‘When the wind will howl for the death of another good man, and we shall have blood flowing in our gutters.’

Her voice had dropped to a whisper, and although Bartholomew knew it was a trick such people often used to make their prophecies sound more convincing, he was unable to suppress a shudder. ‘It has already howled for another good man: Hemmysby.’

‘It has not finished yet,’ she hissed. ‘Not by a long way. It blew for Knyt and it blew for Hemmysby – not for Elvesmere and Ratclyf, obviously, as they were not good men – but it will howl a third time before peace reigns again. Perhaps it will be for you. Or for His Majesty’s favourite – the man who founded Winwick Hall.’

Bartholomew regarded her in horror. The King would never forgive the University
or
the town if anything happened to his Keeper of the Privy Seal, and a monarch was in a position to wreak bitter and very inconvenient revenge with heavy fines and penalties.

‘But better John Winwick than you,’ she went on. ‘
He
does not physick the sick. Would you like a protective charm? I will let you have one for free – payment for all the medicine you give me.’

‘It is kind, but—’

‘You need one,’ she interrupted. ‘Some folk wish you harm after what you did for Potmoor. Here, take it. It is the most powerful amulet I own.’

It was a fist-sized stone on a string, etched with runes, and was so obviously heathen that he declined to take it. ‘You might need it yourself if your predictions come true,’ he said.

‘Oh, they will,’ Marjory assured him, slipping the stone into his bag. ‘I have never been more certain of anything in my life. I have heard about those poisonings, by the way.’

‘Oh,’ said Bartholomew, startled by the abrupt change of topic. ‘Have you?’

‘Yes, and in my humble opinion, Potmoor is the most likely culprit.’ She did not sound humble at all as she continued to pontificate. ‘He is often at Winwick Hall, where Ratclyf and Elvesmere were murdered, and he loves Olivia Knyt, the wife of another victim. You might want to ask what went in the medicine she made to soothe her husband’s “colic”.’