‘River trout stuffed with almonds, raisin bread, and I have been baking pastries most of this week,’ she replied, a little unsettled by the monk’s intense interest. ‘Meat is still forbidden, of course, but fish can be made interesting with a little imagination.’
‘It certainly can,’ agreed Michael vehemently. ‘What kind of pastries?’
‘There are your Benedictine friends,’ said Bartholomew, uncomfortable that Michael was quizzing his sister about what was supposed to be a family occasion. ‘Janius and Timothy.’
‘I will see you tomorrow,’ said Edith to Bartholomew. She nodded to the two Benedictines as they approached, and then was gone, carrying Michael’s hopes for a good meal with her.
Timothy and Janius greeted Michael warmly, and Janius sketched a benediction at him. Both carried large baskets and said they had been distributing bread to the town’s poor.
‘Have you found your killer yet?’ asked Timothy. ‘The scholarly Faricius did not deserve to die in such a manner.’
‘It is not pleasant to think of a killer walking the streets of our town,’ agreed Janius. ‘I hope it will not be long before he is apprehended.’
‘So do I,’ said Michael. ‘Matt and I are going to the Dominican Friary now, to see whether he can identify the students who were near Faricius yesterday afternoon.’
‘Can we do anything?’ offered Janius. ‘We remembered Faricius in our prayers, of course, but if we can do anything else, you must let us know.’
‘I tried to help yesterday,’ said Timothy, sounding uncomfortable at mentioning something that might sound boastful. ‘Because I was keen to do all I could to avert bloodshed, I accompanied Beadle Meadowman to the Carmelite Friary to ensure that Prior Lincolne would admit him – I was afraid a beadle would not be granted an audience with an important man like a Prior.’
‘I would fine any friary that denied access to my beadles,’ said Michael. ‘But thank you. I suppose the Carmelites could have declined to open the door.’
‘Fortunately, Lincolne was wiser than that,’ said Timothy. ‘I heard Meadowman deliver your order that all Carmelites were to remain within their friary until further notice, and then returned to my own hall as quickly as I could. I did not want to add to your troubles by providing a lone Benedictine for the Dominicans to vent their ire upon.’
‘Actually, the Dominicans and the Benedictines have a truce at the moment,’ said Janius. ‘We both accept nominalism as a basic truth. But I do not think most students really care about the realism – nominalism debate. It is just a convenient excuse for a good fight.’
‘That is certainly true,’ said Michael. ‘But I will have these six Dominicans under lock and key today, if I think they are responsible for Faricius’s death.’
‘Good,’ said Janius. ‘We will pray that justice is done. Now, in fact.’
He crossed himself vigorously and his blue eyes lit with pleasure as he sensed a cause that was worthy of his religious attentions. He bade farewell to Michael, and began to stride towards the Church of St Andrew that stood just outside the Barnwell Gate. Timothy followed him, his head already bowed as he began his own pious meditations.
‘They are good men,’ said Michael warmly, watching them go. ‘And there are not many of those around these days.’
Chapter 2
ON THEIR WAY BACK TO THE DOMINICAN FRIARY, Bartholomew and Michael met Walcote, who offered to accompany them with a pack of beadles, in case the Dominicans took exception to the Senior Proctor arresting some of their number. With Walcote and the men at his heels, Michael strode up to the friary gate and hammered on it. It was answered almost immediately by a strange-looking man, whose hair stood in an uncertain halo around his tonsure and who had a wild look in his eyes.
‘Clippesby,’ said Michael in surprise. ‘What are you doing here? I thought you were at Michaelhouse, overseeing the polishing of our silver in preparation for Easter.’
‘I finished that,’ said Clippesby shyly. ‘Then I offered to help the cooks shred the cabbage, but they were afraid I might cut myself, so I went for a walk instead.’
Then the cooks had been very tactful, thought Bartholomew, hiding a smile. It was well known in the town that the Dominican John Clippesby, Michaelhouse’s master of music and astronomy, was not entirely in control of his faculties, and that he was always being given time-consuming and usually pointless tasks to keep him out of harm’s way. The cooks would certainly not want him in the kitchen with a sharp knife in his hands.
‘But what are you doing
‘I heard there was trouble between my Order and the Carmelites, so I thought I should come to see what was happening,’ replied Clippesby. ‘But I was just leaving, actually. For some reason, Prior Morden said he did not want me here, and suggested that I should go home.’
‘I bet he did,’ muttered Michael, who had been trying for some time, without success, to foist the unstable Dominican back on his own friary and out of Michaelhouse. Morden was no fool, however, and had no more wish to have a madman imposed on him than Michaelhouse had been.
‘All the Dominicans are inside,’ Clippesby went on. ‘Prior Morden says that it is too dangerous for anyone to be out, although he said
Bartholomew felt a surge of anger against Morden. The Prior knew perfectly well that marauding Carmelites would not ask a man wearing the habit of a Dominican whether he lived at the friary or whether he was a member of a College. It would be irrelevant anyway: the Carmelites’ antagonism was not aimed at the friary in particular, it was aimed at the Dominicans in general. Clippesby would have provided an ideal target for the little group of sullen Carmelites Bartholomew and Michael had just followed home.
‘Wait here,’ said Bartholomew, reluctant for Clippesby to be alone. ‘We will walk to Michaelhouse with you after we have spoken to Morden.’
‘I will be all right,’ said Clippesby, beginning to move away from them. ‘Saint Balthere appeared to me this morning and instructed me to pray for him in St Michael’s Church. He would not have done that if any harm was due to befall me, would he?’
‘Saint who?’ asked Michael warily.
‘That does not necessarily follow,’ said Bartholomew, worried that the Dominican’s unstable condition might be taking a turn for the worse. ‘Wait here until we have spoken to Morden.’
But Clippesby was already wandering away down the road, and Bartholomew had glimpsed the distant look in his eyes that always appeared when the voices inside his head began to claim his attention. In the physician’s opinion, the conversations seemed to be heavily one-sided, with Clippesby doing most of the talking. How the saints managed to make him shut up long enough to pass any kind of message to him was entirely beyond Bartholomew’s understanding.
‘He will come to no harm,’ said Walcote reassuringly, seeing Bartholomew’s concern. ‘Everyone knows he is touched, and so will leave him alone. If the truth be known, I think he frightens people. They do not understand the things he says and does, and they are afraid of him.’
‘They have good reason to be,’ announced Michael. ‘I am afraid of him myself.’
Still glancing uneasily behind him at Clippesby, who sauntered along Hadstock Way as if he had not a care in the world, Bartholomew followed Michael and Walcote across the Dominicans’ courtyard to the Prior’s lodging. They were hurriedly intercepted by a man with heavy brow-ridge, like an ape, who introduced himself as Thomas Ringstead, the Prior’s secretary. He instructed them to wait until Prior Morden had been informed that he had visitors – something that invariably annoyed Michael, who liked to burst in on people unawares to see if he could catch them doing something he could use to his advantage.
After a chilly wait in the courtyard, where a sharp wind blew dead leaves from the previous autumn around
