looking dagger in his belt. The hand that rested on its hilt had a semicircular mark that Bartholomew immediately recognised as a bite. Michael had bitten one of the men who had attacked them on the High Street the previous week, while Bartholomew knew he had broken the arm of another: Will and the servant who stood next to him.
'Well, you might not have our relic with you,' said Thorpe, oblivious to Will's implicit threat, 'but I know that you, or another of the Chancellor's men, have taken it away. We found this precious thing. It came to us in the knowledge that it would be revered and honoured at Valence Marie.'
To say nothing of its use to amass wealth, thought Bartholomew. 'I really have no idea where it is,' he said.
'And I cannot imagine that the Chancellor would arrange to have it taken by stealth. You do Master de Wetherset an injustice, sir.'
Thorpe clenched his fist again, and Bartholomew thought he was going to strike him. But Thorpe's hand had already been bruised by punching Michael, and he was loath to risk harming himself a second time.
'We will see,' he said. He turned to Will. 'Make sure they cannot escape. Lock them in, and we will go to discuss this with the Chancellor.'
He turned on his heel and stalked out. Bartholomew's arms were pulled behind him and tied securely. Will still regarded him with his curious glittering eyes.
'You go with the Master,' he said to the students, nodding at Thorpe's retreating back. 'Henry, Jacob and I will remain here and guard these two.'
Bartholomew struggled to stand. He thought quickly, knowing that if he were left alone with Will and his cronies, he and Michael would not live to tell how they knew that the hand of Valence Marie did not belong to Simon d'Ambrey.
'Can your Master not manage his affairs without the entire College at his heels?' he shouted, trying to shame some of the retreating scholars into staying behind.
'Do you find it necessary to follow him around like | faithful dogs?'
Father Eligius, one of Bartholomew's patients, hesitated.
'This is an important matter, Matthew. If all Valence Marie's Fellows are present and in complete agreement, it will add weight to our case that this sacred relic belongs here.'
'But there is no sacred relic,' said Bartholomew desperately.
'It is the hand of a recently dead corpse planted in the Ditch by Will and his associates. It belonged to Mistress Starre's son.'
Eligius looked startled, while the other Fellows laughed in derision.
'Will has been a faithful servant since the College was founded,' said Eligius reproachfully. 'Such an accusation does you discredit, Matthew.'
'But it is true!' pressed Bartholomew. 'Think about it!
Why should a sacred relic have a pin to hold the bones together? Because it was carefully prepared by Will! And why was it wearing a ring recently stolen from the David's student murdered just outside your walls? And why did Will just happen to have a fine casket lined with satin to use as a reliquary for it?'
'This is nonsense,' said a burly, angry-looking man, whom Bartholomew recognised as Master Dittone, as he ushered the students from the hall. 'I am surprised at you, Bartholomew. I always thought you were a man of integrity. Now I learn that you steal, prowl around other colleges with weapons and make vile accusations against lowly servants who are not in a position to answer back.'
'Do not be too harsh on him,' said Eligius kindly.
'Doctor Bartholomew suffered a grievous wound to the head recently, and his stars are poorly aligned.'
Bartholomew's spirits sank. Would there be no end to the repercussions of Gray's impetuous diagnosis? 'The relic is a fake!' he insisted to the last of the retreating scholars. Dittone shot him a vicious look and, for a moment, appeared as though he would like to silence Bartholomew permanently, there and then. He was edged firmly to the door by Eligius, who then paused.
'Take good care of them, Will,' he said. 'Remember the doctor is unwell and needs to be treated with sympathy. It is not his fault that he was driven to steal the relic but the fault of the devils that possess him.'
'Eligius!' cried Bartholomew as the Dominican friar closed the door behind him. 'Stay with us!'
The door shut with a clank and Bartholomew's words echoed around the silent hall. Will exchanged glances with his friends. Bartholomew began to back away down the hall, while Will, ensuring that the door was locked, drew his dagger and followed.
Bartholomew saw Henry draw his own dagger and lean over Michael, who still lay flat on his back. The students had not tied the monk's hands, but he was insensible.
Bartholomew looked around him desperately for some kind of weapon but realised that even a broadsword would be useless to him with his hands bound. He saw Henry hold Michael's head back as he prepared to cut his throat. Henry then watched Will, waiting for an order.
'That hand, Will,' said Bartholomew, hoping to distract them long enough to give him a chance to think of some way to escape. 'It was Starre's, was it not? You took it the night of the first riot.'
Will grinned, but did not stop his relentless advance.
'The first riot gave us plenty of time to acquire the limb of a recently dead pauper, and we did the body no harm.
We could not risk you claiming the hand belonged to a woman because it was overly small.'
'But it broke as you boiled it. You had to mend it with a pin.'
Will pulled an unpleasant face. 'I might have known it was you who told the Chancellor that. Fortunately, Master Thorpe was not deterred by so minor a point and it did nothing to diminish his belief in the relic's sanctity.'
'And then, a couple of days later, with the hand suitably prepared, you pretended to find it in the Ditch. By then, it was wearing the ring that Father Andrew — Simon d'Ambrey, should I say — had given to you.'
Will began to gain on Bartholomew, who continued to speak as he backed down the hall.
'You had even made a fine box for it in advance, lined with satin for it to lie on.'
'What if I did?' asked Will with a shrug. 'But there is nothing you can do about it now and we cannot have you running all over the town claiming that our saintly relic is a fake.'
'But it is a fake,' Bartholomew pointed out.
'Did you take it?' asked Will, still advancing. He fingered his dagger. Jacob, the man with the broken arm, picked up a piece of broken pot in his good hand, and prepared to follow.
'I do not think he did, Will,' he said, 'or he would not have come back.'
'True, I suppose,' said Will grudgingly. 'But he has the book by Galen that Master d'Ambrey so badly wanted back. He will be pleased when I give it to him.'
'We know it was you who attacked us that night,' said Bartholomew. 'You three, with Master Bigod, Huw, Saul Potter, and Ivo from David's Hostel. Jacob's arm was broken then, and you were bitten. And it was probably you who searched my room the first two times.'
'We should have finished you then, in the street, along with that meddlesome monk. But Master Bigod was too squeamish, damn him, especially when he saw I was about to kill a man of God. Everything was going to plan until you two started to poke about.'
Jacob hurled his piece of broken pot. Bartholomew ducked as it sailed over his head to crash against the wall in a shower of shards. Undeterred, the servant looked about for something else to throw.
'And it was you who burgled those houses,' said Bartholomew, ducking a second time as a pewter jug narrowly missed him. 'Because you knew exactly where and when the riots would break out, you were able to use the opportunity to select the houses of certain rich merchants and steal from them.'
'So what?' said Jacob, leaning down to grab another IS jug to throw. 'Is it fair that fat merchants should have f more wealth than they know what to do with, while the | rest of us are starving? '? 'You are not starving,' Bartholomew pointed out.
Will gave an unpleasant smile. 'Not now, perhaps, but we have to think of the future, and a man like Simon i d'Ambrey always needs funds.'
'I bet he does,' said Bartholomew. 'Funds for paying people to incite riots, funds to have corpses desecrated, funds to assassinate people he does not like.'
