over buying space on the barges moored at the wharves, to secrete their ill-gotten gains away before the Sheriff found them.
The cause of all the panic was at the house of Constantine Mortimer. Indignant gibbering pursued Tulyet as he emerged from Mortimer’s house carrying a box. The baker scuttled after him, his red, bellicose face outraged, while his son Edward and wife Katherine were at his heels. Mortimer saw Bartholomew, and stopped dead in his tracks.
‘For God’s sake, man!’ he hissed, looking around him furtively. ‘Take off those damned gloves or you will have us both in the Sheriff’s prisons!’
‘I am sure Matt will furnish me with a receipt for those – should I feel the need to ask him for one,’ said Tulyet, making Mortimer jump by speaking in his ear. ‘Quite unlike this wine, I imagine.’
‘I had no idea that was there,’ Mortimer insisted angrily. ‘I never use that cellar. It is damp.’
‘Of course,’ said Tulyet drily. ‘Someone must have slipped into your cellars and hidden it carefully behind that pile of old crates for safekeeping. It is odd how so many people seem to have found themselves in the same position today.’
‘You are quite mistaken, father,’ said Edward nervously. ‘You bought that wine last summer. You have been keeping it to allow it to mature.’
‘The King allows his wines to mature before drinking them,’ put in Katherine.
‘Rubbish!’ said Mortimer impatiently. ‘I remember purchasing no wine.’
‘Of course you do, dear,’ said Katherine, favouring him with an indulgent smile. ‘You said we might drink it to celebrate Edward’s coming of age.’
Mortimer looked taken aback, and his certainty began to waver. ‘Did I?’ he said, frowning.
Bartholomew went to the box Tulyet was placing on the back of a cart and looked inside. There were six bottles made of smoked glass, the wine dark red inside them. He started back. The last time he had seen such a bottle it had been smashed on the floor under Isaac’s work-bench. He exchanged a glance with Michael.
‘When did you purchase this wine?’ asked Michael. ‘And where?’
‘Why?’ demanded Edward, uncharacteristically aggressive. ‘Father’s wines are no concern of the University.’
‘Really?’ said Michael, fixing him with a hard stare.
‘It is just good French wine,’ said Katherine, smiling lightly. ‘No more, no less.’
Mortimer looked from one to the other belligerently. ‘All this fuss over half a crate of wine!’ he snapped. ‘If Katherine says I bought it, I did. I will have a receipt somewhere for it. I will hunt it out tomorrow.’
‘You will not find it,’ said Michael. ‘Because you never bought it.’ He turned to Edward and Katherine. ‘Despite the fact that your family is trying to suggest you did.’
‘He did buy it,’ insisted Edward. ‘Just because he does not remember, it does not mean to say it did not happen.’
‘You cheeky whelp!’ said Mortimer, taking a step towards his son threateningly. ‘Do you imply I am losing my wits? The business is not yours yet, Edward; you must wait until I die.’
Edward said nothing, although his expression indicated that Mortimer’s words generated ambiguous emotions within him: while he might long to be rid of his dominating, bellicose father, he certainly did not relish the prospect of inheriting a business in which he had no interest.
‘Perhaps you would care to try some,’ said Katherine, leaning into the box to take a bottle and offer it to Michael. ‘We have already sampled the other six bottles and found it most delicious.’
‘But James Grene did not,’ said Bartholomew. ‘And neither did Brother Armel.’
Mortimer stared at him and then began to laugh. ‘The University’s poisoned wine! You think this is it! How ridiculous! Give it to me. I will prove how wrong you are.’
He snatched the wine from Katherine and raised it to his mouth to draw out the cork with his teeth. Bartholomew slapped his hand down.
‘No,’ he said. He took the bottle carefully from the indignant Mortimer and held it out to Edward. ‘You drink it.’
Edward regarded the bottle in horror and put his hands behind his back.
‘Edward does not drink wine,’ said Katherine quickly. ‘It makes him sick.’
‘Rubbish!’ said Mortimer. ‘He had some last night with no ill effects. Drink the wine, Edward. Prove to these insolent scholars how they slander the name of Mortimer.’
Edward reached out a hand and slowly took the bottle from Bartholomew. Hesitantly, he began to raise it to his lips.
‘No!’ Katherine dashed the bottle from Edward’s hand and it smashed on the ground. Everyone leapt backwards and, for a moment, all eyes were on the dark liquid that pooled in the mud of the street. Then Edward tore towards Tulyet, knocked him off his feet, and had darted up Milne Street before anyone could stop him. Tulyet’s men gaped at him stupidly before the Sheriff’s angry cry set them racing after him.
Mortimer looked about him in confusion. ‘What is going on?’ he demanded of Katherine. ‘What is he doing? Stupid boy! How does he imagine he will become a Master Baker when he is given to this kind of behaviour?’
Tulyet climbed to his feet and took Katherine by the arm. ‘It seems you have some explaining to do, madam. Your husband is not the only one who wants to know what you have been plotting.’
Katherine met his eyes coolly, but said nothing.
‘For God’s sake, Katherine!’ yelled Mortimer in sudden fury. ‘What is happening?’
‘Nothing!’ she said to Tulyet. ‘Edward and I have done nothing. The wine is Constantine’s.’
‘It is over, Katherine,’ said Tulyet quietly. ‘It is clear Master Mortimer knows nothing about this wine. But it is equally clear that you and Edward do.’
‘Not so,’ said Katherine in the same calm voice. ‘Edward is a timid boy, and he has always been frightened of his father. It was from Constantine he fled, not from you as a sign of guilt.’
‘Who was the third person?’ demanded Michael. ‘It was you and Edward who went to Gonville to reclaim the poisoned wine from Isaac once you realised it was there. You knocked me over as you came racing out. But who else was with you? Who helped you kill Isaac?’
‘We have killed no one,’ said Katherine. ‘I do not know what you are talking about.’
‘What are you saying?’ said Mortimer, bewildered as he looked from Michael to Katherine. ‘Of what are you accusing my wife?’
‘Of murder,’ said Michael. He pointed a soft white finger at the remaining bottles. ‘Crates of wine from this part of France tend to contain a dozen bottles. So, we can assume that originally there were twelve, but that a little over a month ago six were stolen by an opportunistic thief named Sacks.’
‘Sacks?’ queried one of Tulyet’s sergeants, as he lounged against the wall watching the exchange with interest. ‘Has he been busy again?’
‘Sacks sold the wine he stole from you in the Brazen George – two bottles to Rob Thorpe and three bottles to Brother Armel. One of Thorpe’s bottles killed Will Harper, the boy we pulled from the well, and the other killed James Grene.’ Michael’s eyes never left Katherine’s face. ‘Harper died more than a month ago, but it was not until last Saturday that Sacks tried to sell the remaining bottles.’
‘Sacks has been in the castle prison,’ said Tulyet’s sergeant, eager to join in. ‘We kept him for three weeks for selling stolen goods. It was a petty matter and we did not think to bother you with it, Master Tulyet, knowing how all your time was taken up with hunting down the outlaws. He was released last Saturday – the morning of the installation.’
‘I see,’ said Michael. He turned his attention back to Katherine. ‘You must have thought you were off the hook when no tales of violent death were rumoured around the town. Then last Saturday Grene died horribly and publicly at the installation. Edward was there and must have seen it – although you were absent because of your husband’s illness. It was followed by rumours about the death of Armel, and you knew the wine was finally beginning to surface.’
Katherine shook her head and smiled. ‘I really have no idea what you are talking about. I know nothing of stolen wine. I have already told you we drank the six bottles you see missing from the crate.’
Michael continued relentlessly. ‘In desperation, knowing that it might be traced back to you via Sacks, you took steps to remove the evidence – you stole four of the bottles from Michaelhouse, first terrifying poor Walter, our porter, out of his wits, and then went to Gonville to see whether Matt had been called to physic another case
