Michael waved his hand expansively. ‘No, but once Tulyet has a couple of these smugglers in his cells, they will soon reveal who the ringleaders are. He should be rounding them up even as we speak.’ He swirled the wine around in his cup as Bartholomew paced restlessly.
‘I do not see why the mutilation of Egil was necessary,’ said Bartholomew. ‘The man was dead. There was nothing to be gained from it. Unless …’
‘Unless what?’ asked Michael, looking up from his wine.
‘Something Deynman said,’ said Bartholomew, frowning.
‘I can tell I am about to be treated to some great pearl of wisdom,’ said Michael drily. ‘What could Deynman say that would possibly stick in your mind?’
‘When he was asked how he would treat a head wound in his disputation, he said he would poke about in it to make certain there was nothing more serious hidden underneath.’
‘Oh, Matt!’ said Michael with a face of disgust. ‘The boy is deranged. I take it you did not teach him that? God forbid he should ever come near me if I am injured!’
‘But what he says might make sense in the case of Egil,’ said Bartholomew, sitting down abruptly. ‘I wonder if that was why his head was taken – to hide another wound.’
‘But we saw the wound,’ said Michael. ‘A great soggy mess at the back of his skull where sweet Julianna brained him.’
‘No, not that wound,’ said Bartholomew. ‘But there might have been others. Like blisters in his mouth and burns on his hands.’
Michael stared at him. ‘What are you saying? That Egil was poisoned?’
Bartholomew stood and began to pace again. ‘No. He could not have been – he was certainly not lacking in strength when he fought me. Forget what I said. It was foolish and implausible, even for this unsavoury affair.’
‘But removing a head from a corpse is an implausible action,’ said Michael, leaning forward with his elbows on the table. ‘Let us think through this notion of yours, before dismissing it out of hand. Tulyet and Stanmore said that Egil was a Fenman – and we know smuggling has been a source of income for Fenland families for generations. It is entirely possible that Egil was involved in smuggling. You saw his body, and you said there were no injuries – other than the fact that he was missing his head and hands – so it seems he was not harmed as Alan and his men attacked us. In which case, we can assume that he was known to them. It is even possible he was sent to hunt us down after we escaped the fire at Denny.’
‘And so his head and hands were taken because his associates were afraid that they might reveal something to us,’ said Bartholomew. ‘They did not take his clothes, so it was clearly not his identity that they were trying to hide. I keep coming back to the poisoned wine and tell-tale burns. It is the only reason I can think of for which these people might go to such extremes.’
The door opened silently and Cynric stepped lightly into the room. Abandoning the remains of his repast, Michael stood to greet him, his eyebrows raised expectantly.
‘I was afraid I would lose Rob Thorpe if I stopped to fetch you first,’ said Cynric without preamble, ‘so I followed him to see where he went.’
‘And where did he go?’ asked Michael, folding his arms, and throwing a superior glance at Bartholomew. ‘Now we will see, my friend. I wager you anything you like that Rob Thorpe will have fled straight to his accomplice to discuss how best to deal with the unwanted attentions of the Senior Proctor and his colleagues.’
‘No, he did not,’ said Cynric. ‘He went to St Botolph’s Church. He knelt at the altar for a while – alone – and then he went back to Master Stanmore’s house without having spoken to anyone.’
‘Nothing!’ spat Michael in disgust at breakfast the following day, ignoring the admonishing looks of Alcote and Father William for speaking. ‘Cynric watched Oswald Stanmore’s premises all night and Rob Thorpe did not so much as put a foot outside. Are you certain there is no other way out?’
Bartholomew nodded. ‘The only door is at the front. Perhaps we are wrong and Thorpe has no ally at Valence Marie after all. Perhaps Edith and Oswald are right and we are mistaken.’
‘We are not mistaken!’ snapped Michael in frustration, drawing further disapproving glares from his colleagues and the interested attentions of the students at the next table. He grabbed a lump of bread made from grey, grainy flour and gnawed at it so that crumbs snowed down the front of his habit. ‘Gray and the others saw Thorpe buying the poisoned wine from Sacks; Father Philius attended a dead apprentice at Stanmore’s business premises; you and I know it was Thorpe who helped us carry Grene’s body from Valence Marie’s hall. Even if we have misinterpreted some of the facts, the evidence that remains is overwhelming: Thorpe is involved in Grene’s death without question. And he could not have gained access to Valence Marie without help.’
‘I wonder why he went to St Botolph’s,’ said Bartholomew, deliberately not looking at Alcote, who was trying to catch his eye to warn him against talking without breaking silence himself. Had he not been discussing something as sombre as murder, Bartholomew would have found his antics amusing. On Alcote’s other side, the surly Langelee sipped his watered ale carefully, his red-rimmed eyes and unsteady hands suggesting he was not in much of a condition to care whether his colleagues talked during the meal or not, as long as they kept their voices low.
Next to Kenyngham, whose anger of the previous day had faded so that he was back to his usual absent- minded geniality, Runham regarded the restless students with his heavily lidded eyes. Gray stared back, although even his insolence and confidence was no match for Runham, and he was the first to look away. Runham shifted his gaze to Deynman who, knowing he was in disgrace for failing his disputation, at least had the grace to turn red and shuffle his feet uncomfortably on the floor.
‘Oh, why Thorpe went to church is no mystery,’ replied Michael with a flap of a flabby hand. ‘I spoke to the priests there last night – just as your brother-in-law advised us to do. Thorpe earns extra pennies by sweeping their church, and apparently, over the last few weeks, has taken to haunting the place even when there is no sweeping to be done. He told the priests that he likes to be there to escape from the childish behaviour of Stanmore’s younger apprentices.’
‘So, what shall we do next?’ asked Bartholomew, sipping Michaelhouse’s cloudy breakfast ale with a grimace. ‘Cynric needs to rest, and I am not going to watch Oswald’s house all day. Supposing Edith spotted me?’
Michael leaned plump elbows on the table and sighed. ‘Perhaps Tulyet’s excursions of the past two days will yield some results. At least we no longer need to worry about the smugglers – that is in his hands now.’
‘We certainly do need to worry, Brother,’ said Bartholomew fervently. ‘They tried to kill us, and I will continue to worry until I am certain they are all secured in Tulyet’s prison cells.’
They stood for grace, and then trailed across the muddy yard towards their rooms. It was almost six o’clock and time for teaching to begin, but Bartholomew felt strangely apathetic towards it. Bulbeck’s failure – whatever the excuse – had been an unpleasant shock, and he wondered whether Langelee was right, and that he should concentrate more on teaching traditional medicine than on telling his students his own theories – regardless of his personal beliefs.
Just as this thought crossed Bartholomew’s mind, Langelee swaggered towards them, and intercepted their perilous journey across the morass that claimed to be Michaelhouse’s courtyard. He went through an elaborate pantomime of showing Bartholomew his hands, to prove that he was unarmed and that the physician had no need to draw his own weapon. Bartholomew raised his eyes heavenwards, and tried to walk past him without speaking. Langelee grabbed his shoulder, and Bartholomew flinched backwards at the strong smell of wine that wafted into his face. No wonder he had been fragile at breakfast – he was still drunk from the night before.
‘I wondered if I might borrow the copy of Aristotle’s
‘It is my own copy, not Michaelhouse’s,’ said Bartholomew. ‘But you may borrow it if you like. I find it a difficult text, and would like to come to listen to your debate.’
Michael seized the physician’s sleeve and tried to pull him away, guessing that Bartholomew’s motive for attending Langelee’s debate would not be to learn.
