'Who asked for me?' Bartholomew asked again. He was beginning to be annoyed.
'I do not know, just some man. I am only the messenger.'
Bartholomew increased his speed, and quickly left the student puffing and wheezing behind him. It was only a matter of moments before the walls of St Radegund's loomed up out of the early morning mist. He pounded on the door, leaning against the wall to get his breath, his legs unsteady from a brisk run on an empty stomach and anticipation of what was to come.
A small grille in the door snapped open. 'What do you want?' came a sharp voice.
'It is Matthew Bartholomew. I was sent for,' he gasped.
'Not by us,' and the grille slammed shut.
Bartholomew groaned and banged on the door again. There was no reply.
'You are unlikely to get an answer now.'
Bartholomew spun round, and the student found himself pinned against the wall by the throat. 'Hey! I am only the messenger!' he croaked, eyes wide in his face.
Bartholomew relented and loosened his grip, although not by much.
'Who sent for me?' he asked again, his voice dangerously quiet.
'I do not know his name. I will have to show you,' the student said, trying to prise Bartholomew's hands from his throat, some of his former cockiness gone.
He led the way around the walls towards the convent gardens. 'My name is Samuel Gray,' he said.
Bartholomew ignored him. 'I am a medical student at Bene't Hostel.'
Bartholomew saw they were heading for a small shack where garden tools were kept. He and Philippa had sheltered there from a summer thunderstorm once as they had walked together among the fruit bushes.
That had been only a few short months before, but to Bartholomew it seemed in another lifetime. Gray reached the hut first, and pushed open the door. Bartholomew took a step inside and peered into the gloom, trying to see what was inside.
'Philippa!' She was kneeling in a corner next to a figure lying on the floor.
'Matt!' She leapt to her feet, and before Bartholomew could prevent her, she had thrown herself into his arms. His first instinct was to force her away, lest he carried the contagion with him somehow in his clothes, but the shack was already rank with the smell of the plague, so there was little point. He allowed all else to be driven from his mind as he enjoyed the first contact he had had with Philippa since the plague began.
Suddenly she pushed him away. 'What are you doing here?' she said. 'Who asked you to come?'
Bartholomew gazed at her in confusion. He looked around at Gray, who stood at the door looking as surprised as Bartholomew.
'I do not know,' Gray said. 'It was a man. He told me to bring you here, and that he would be waiting to meet you.'
Bartholomew looked back at Philippa. 'I do not know of any man,' she said. 'I have been here since dawn. I had a message to come, and I found Sister Clement here. She has the plague.'
'But who told you to come? And how did you get out? I thought the convent was sealed.' 'I do not know, to answer your first question. A message came written on a scrap of parchment pushed under the door. I came here immediately. In answer to your other question, there is a small gate near the kitchens that is always open, although few know of it.
Sister Clement has been using it regularly to slip out and go among the poor.' Her voice caught, and Bartholomew put his arms round her again.
He said nothing while she sobbed quietly, and Gray shuffled his feet in the doorway. On the floor, Sister Clement was near the end, her laboured breathing almost inaudible. Philippa looked at her, and raised her eyes pleadingly to Bartholomew. 'Can you help her?'
Bartholomew shook his head. He had seen so many similar cases during the last few weeks that he did not even need to examine her to know that there was nothing he could do. Even lancing the swellings at this point would do no more than cause unnecessary suffering.
'But you are a physician! You must be able to do something!'
Bartholomew flinched. These were words he heard every day, but they hurt nevertheless. He went over to look at the old lady, and arranged her arms so that the pressure on the swellings under them would be reduced.
The buboes in her groin had burst, emitting the smell which Bartholomew had come to know well, but that still filled him with disgust. He sent Gray to find a priest to give her last rites, and sat back helplessly. Behind him, Philippa cried softly. He took her hand and led her outside into the clean morning air.
'Why did you come, Matt?' asked Philippa.
'That student came and said I was needed at St Radegund's. He does not seem to know by whom.' 'I receive a message to come here, sent by an unknown person, then you do. What is going on? Who wants us here together?' Philippa looked around her as if expecting the unknown person to emerge from the bushes.
'Friend or foe?' asked Bartholomew absently. He was horribly afraid that it was the latter, someone who wanted Philippa to come into contact with a plague victim, and Bartholomew to know it. He felt a sudden anger. Who would want to do such a thing? What had either of them done to harm anyone else? 'Now I am out of that horrid place, I will not go back,' said Philippa with a sudden fierce determination.
'I refuse. I can stay with you and Giles. I can sleep in your medicine room.'
'There is plague at the College, Philippa,' said Bartholomew. 'You would not be safe.'
'There is plague here!' said Philippa vehemently, gesturing to the shack behind them. 'And anyway,' she continued, 'I do not approve of the way the nuns skulk behind the convent walls. Sister Clement was the only one with any decency.'
'Do you want to die like that?' asked Bartholomew, gesturing back at the old lady.
'Do you?' countered Philippa. 'You see plague victims every day, and you are well. So is Gregory Colet. Not everyone who touches someone with the Death catches it.'
Bartholomew wondered what to do. It was out of the question to take Philippa to Michaelhouse. Even though Master Wilson was not in a position to do anything about it, the clerics would object. And she could not possibly sleep in the medicines room. The shutters did not close properly, and there were no separate privies that she would be able to use. He would have to take her to Edith's house. Edith had not heeded his advice and locked herself away, and Stanmore was still trying to conduct his trade. Philippa would not be as protected there from the plague as she had been in the convent, but it was the best he could do.
Gray came back over the fields bringing with him an Austin Canon from Barnwell whom he had waylaid.
They listened to his murmurings as he administered last rites to the old nun. After a few minutes he came out, told them that Sister Clement was dead, and went on his way. For him, it would be the first in a long day of such prayers, and who knew whether he would live to see another such day tomorrow?
Bartholomew took Philippa's hand, and together they began to make their way back to Barnwell Causeway.
Gray tagged along behind.
Bartholomew decided to go to Edith's house in Trumpington immediately. They would have to walk because he knew of nowhere where he would be able to hire horses. All the usual places had been struck by the plague, and the horses turned to graze unattended in the fields. Bartholomew turned to Gray.
'Can you tell me anything else about this man who gave you the message? What did he look like?'
Gray shrugged. 'He was wearing a Dominican habit, and his cowl was over his face. He had ink on his fingers, though, and he tripped on the hem of his gown as he left.'
Ink on his fingers. He could be a clerk or a student, unfamiliar enough in the friar's long habit to fall over it when he walked. Were the fanatical scholars after him now? Was this a warning to him that he was vulnerable through Philippa, even though he had thought her safely tucked away in her convent? He wondered why on earth they were bothering. No one who watched the sun rise these days could be certain of seeing it set in the evening. All they had to do was wait. Why had they taken the trouble to poison Aelfrith? As Bartholomew's thoughts of murder came tumbling back, he clutched Philippa's hand tighter, glad to feel something warm and reassuring. She smiled at him, and they began to walk towards Trumpington.
