though. She is afraid he will try to kill her again.’
‘He might,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Poor Eligius!’
‘Yes,’ agreed Michael. ‘It just goes to show that you should never think good of people. If Eligius had been suspicious and cynical like the rest of us, he would never have drunk that wine. But you live and learn. Well, he did not, I suppose. Will you come with me to Valence Marie?’
‘No, thank you,’ said Bartholomew quickly. ‘Every time I visit that College, either someone dies or someone tries to kill me. And anyway, I need to think about this lecture.’
‘Walk with me to the Trumpington Gate, then,’ said Michael, standing and adjusting the cowl on his cloak. ‘Edith told me at church this morning that Mistress Pike is unlikely to last the day. She lives near Valence Marie, so you can keep me company and see her at the same time. You have given lectures on Theophilus a hundred times, and have no need for preparations.’
‘I have seen her twice today already,’ said Bartholomew. ‘There is nothing more I can do.’
But he followed Michael through the orchard towards the back gate. Because it was Sunday, there were no trader’s carts rattling up and down the lane, and the town was unusually peaceful. Agatha’s cockerel crowed somewhere in the distance, and a blackbird sang sweetly from one of the trees in the orchard. They walked in silence, each wrapped in his own thoughts. Bartholomew’s mind jumped between considering whether it was safe to visit Matilde and relieve her of Dame Pelagia, and Edith’s continuing distress over Thorpe. Michael pondered how he might inveigle an invitation to dine at Valence Marie and still manage to have supper at Michaelhouse.
Above, the sky grew blacker as heavy rain clouds gathered, so that it seemed as though dusk was already approaching even though it was only mid-afternoon. A golden shaft of sunrays broke through unexpectedly, and illuminated the soft creamy stone of St Mary’s Church, making it dazzle like gold in the sullen light of the clouds. As they passed, Bartholomew squinted as it reflected off the shiny ground, and stumbled from not being able to see where he was treading. But the sunlight was short-lived, and by the time they reached the Trumpington Gate, the clouds had filled in the gaps, and the first, great drops of rain began to fall, splattering into the mud.
‘If this foul weather continues, we will be forced to build an ark,’ grumbled Michael, glancing upwards. ‘I had no idea the heavens could hold so much water!’
Still muttering complaints, he stamped inside Valence Marie, while Bartholomew continued on to the house of the ailing Mistress Pike. His journey was wasted, however, because he was told she had died a few moments earlier. Since she was well over eighty years old, Bartholomew supposed he should not be surprised, but the death of a patient always unsettled him. Her family politely insisted that he should stay until the storm passed over, but Bartholomew did not feel comfortable waiting in a house filled with grieving relatives and left as soon as he could.
The rain was coming down hard, and the cloak Paul had lent him had no hood. For an instant, he regretted his decision not to tarry at Mistress Pike’s house, but then realised he would be able to take shelter in the little church of St Peter-without-Trumpington Gate. Breaking into a run as the drops fell more heavily, he dashed through the grassy graveyard and took the great brass handle in both hands to open the door. It was locked. Bartholomew swore under his breath, flinching as large, cold drips splattered on his bare head. But it made sense to keep the building secured: it was vulnerable, standing as it did outside the city gates with the outlaws’ attacks drawing ever nearer to the town.
He stood under a tree in the churchyard, trying to keep out of the wet. He glanced up the High Street. The guards on the gate had abandoned their posts, and the few people who were braving the downpour passed through it unquestioned. Bartholomew did not relish the notion of walking back to Michaelhouse in weather so foul that he could barely see, and decided it might be an opportune time to visit his medical colleague Master Lynton at nearby Peterhouse. Now that Philius was dead, he and Bartholomew were the only physicians in Cambridge, and were likely to be thrown more and more into each other’s company. And they could start, Bartholomew decided, by debating some of the issues in Theophilus’s
Pulling his cloak closer around him, grateful for Mortimer’s smuggled gloves to protect his hands against the icy chill of the rain, he was about to leave the partial shelter of the tree and run the short distance to Peterhouse, when a sudden prod in his back made him stop. He started to turn, but was arrested by a voice hissing in his ear.
‘Do not move! I have a sharp knife, Bartholomew. You do what I say, or I will kill you.’ The knife jabbed again. ‘Do you understand?’
Bartholomew nodded, his heart pounding. Was this one of the men who had tried to kill him and Michael in the Fens, back for a second attempt? He started to turn again, but the knife pricked at his spine, harder this time.
‘Be still!’
The voice was no longer a hiss, and Bartholomew was able to recognise it.
‘Harling!’
‘Harling!’ the voice behind him mimicked. ‘Harling, indeed! Now, we are going to walk together through the churchyard and away from the road. If you shout out, or try to alert anyone, I will strike you dead. The guards are unlikely to venture from their lodge in this weather, but it pays to be cautious.’
The Vice-Chancellor took a firm hold on Bartholomew’s right arm with his left hand, while his right hand pushed the knife into Bartholomew’s side, just under the ribs. The physician inched away, repelled by the sickly odour of perfumed grease from Harling’s slicked hair, but Harling held him tightly, and forced him back into the tangle of bushes and trees that surrounded the church.
At first, the foliage became denser, and Bartholomew wondered whether Harling meant to murder him there, where his body might not be found for days. But then the tangle thinned and he found they were at the edge of Coe Fen, an area of common land between the King’s Mill and Peterhouse. The extended rains had flooded it, so it was no longer viable for grazing, and the meadows were deserted. Bartholomew moved his feet, hearing the squelch of sodden grass, and knew the chances of someone passing that way to help him were remote. Further downstream, the great King’s Mill wheel pounded the water of the mill race. With a distant part of his mind, Bartholomew wondered why the miller would risk using it when the Cam was in full spate – especially considering it was a Sunday, when work was forbidden.
Harling pushed him forwards until they stood near the edge of the swollen river, close to where it swirled past in a muddy brown torrent of eddies and waves. It had ripped small trees and branches from its banks further upstream, and these bobbed and dipped in its unsteady currents. Bartholomew was suddenly reminded of his near drowning in the Fens, and hoped that was not what Harling had in mind for him.
Cursing, Harling inadvertently glanced down at the ground as his leg sank into mud to the calf, and Bartholomew seized the opportunity to attempt to break away. He hurled himself to one side and tried to scramble out of Harling’s reach. But the ground was slippery with rain, and Harling’s reactions were much faster than he had anticipated. Harling had pounced on him and had the knife at his throat before he could take more than two or three steps away.
‘I may as well tell you now, to avoid any further efforts to escape, that I have your student Sam Gray hidden away in a safe place. If you do not want him found face-down in the King’s Ditch, you will do what I say. Do you understand?’
Bartholomew gazed at him in horror, and forced himself to nod. The Vice-Chancellor moved away from him, although the knife remained in his hand. Swallowing hard, Bartholomew clambered to his feet.
‘You see, I was anticipating meeting you here,’ Harling continued, glancing downstream to where the waterwheel pounded the flooded river into a brown froth. ‘I thought I might have to resort to trickery to entice you out of Michaelhouse in all this rain, but I underestimated your devotion to your patients – poor Mistress Pike. I could not have chosen a better place to ambush you than that jungle Peterhouse calls its churchyard.’
Bartholomew glanced down at the knife in Harling’s hand, and wondered whether the Vice-Chancellor would harm him with it. Harling followed his gaze and gave a nasty smile.
‘Do not fool yourself into believing that I will not use this,’ he said, brandishing it. ‘I fought for the King in France before I became a scholar, and killed more men than I care to remember. Run if you will, but I will get you.’
He sprang forwards suddenly and made a deft flick with his wrist. Bartholomew looked down, and saw that Harling had neatly severed the leather straps of the medical bag he always wore looped around his shoulder. As it
