'It is too soon to tell,' Bartholomew said in response.
'You will know where you stand with Master Stapleton by nightfall.'
Burwell looked away. 'We have lost five masters and twelve students,' he said. 'How has Michaelhouse fared?'
'Sixteen students, three commoners, and two Fellows.
The Master died last night.'
'Wilson?' asked Burwell incredulously. 'I thought he was keeping to his room so he would not be infected.'
'So he did,' said Bartholomew. 'But the pestilence claimed him all the same.' He was wondering how to breach the subject of Abigny without sounding too obvious, when Burwell did it for him.
'We heard about Giles Abigny,' he said. 'We heard from Stephen Stanmore that he had been hiding in your sister's attic, and then ran off with Stanmore's horse.'
'Do you have any ideas where Giles might be?'
Bartholomew asked.
Burwell shook his head. 'I never understood what was going on in Giles's head. A strange combination of incredible shallowness mixed with a remarkable depth of learning. I do not know where he might be.'
'When was the last time you saw him?' asked Bartholomew.
Burwell thought carefully. 'He was very shocked at Hugh's death. After that he went wild, trying to squeeze every ounce of pleasure from what he thought might be a short life. He continued in that vein for perhaps a week. Then he seemed to quieten down, and we saw less of him. Then, about two weeks ago, after going to the King's Head, he regaled us with a dreadful tale about cheating at dice and stealing the wages of half the Castle garrison. He had an enormous purseful of money, so perhaps there was some truth in it. He went off quite late, and I have not seen him since.'
Bartholomew tried to hide his disappointment. A sighting two weeks ago did not really help. He stood to leave, and beckoned Gray.
'Please send someone for me at Michaelhouse if I can be of any more help to Cedric,' he said to Burwell.
'And thank you for your assistance with Giles.'
Burwell smiled again, and escorted them to the door. He watched as they made their way down Bene't Street and the smile faded from his face.
He beckoned to a student, and whispered in his ear. Within a few moments, the student was scurrying out of the hostel towards Milne Street, his cloak held tightly against the chill of the winter afternoon.
Bartholomew and Gray spent two fruitless hours enquiring after Abigny in the town's taverns. They came up with nothing more than Burwell had told them, except that Abigny's idiosyncrasies seemed to be notorious among the townspeople.
Bartholomew was ready to give up, and retire to bed, when Gray, with a display of energy that made Bartholomew wonder whether he had been at the medicine store, suggested they walk to Trumpington to visit the Laughing Pig.
'It is best we visit at night,' he said. 'More people will be there, and they will have had longer for the ale to loosen their tongues.'
So the two set off for Trumpington. Although it was only two miles, Bartholomew felt he was walking to the ends of the Earth. A bitter wind blew directly into their faces and cut through their clothes. It was a clear night, and they could hear the crack and splinter of the water freezing in the ruts and puddles on the track as the temperature dropped.
Bartholomew breathed a sigh of relief when the Laughing Pig came into sight. Within a few minutes they were seated in the tavern's large whitewashed room with frothing tankards of ale in front of them. The tavern was busy, and a fire crackled in a hearth in the middle of the room, filling it with pungent smoke as well as warmth.
The floor was simple beaten earth, which was easier to keep clean than rushes.
Bartholomew was well known in Trumpington, and several people nodded at him in a friendly fashion. He struck up a conversation with a large, florid-faced man who fished for eels in the spring and minded Stanmore's cows for the rest of the year. The man immediately began to gossip about the disappearance of Philippa.
Bartholomew was dismayed, but not surprised, that her flight had become the subject of village chatter doubtless by way of Stanmore's party of horsemen who had tried to catch up with the fleeing Abigny.
Overhearing the discussion, several others joined in, including the tavern maid with whom Abigny had claimed he was in love back in the summer. She perched on the edge of the table, casting nervous glances backwards to make sure the landlord did not catch her skiving.
'How long do you think Giles Abigny was pretending to be his sister?' Bartholomew asked casually, in a rare moment of silence.
There was a hubbub of conflicting answers. Everyone, it seemed, had ideas and theories. But listening to them, Bartholomew knew that was all they were. He stopped paying attention and sipped at the sour ale.
'Giles was odd a long time before he did this,' whispered the tavern maid, who, as Abigny had said, was indeed pretty. She glanced towards the next table where the landlord was serving and pretended to clean up near Bartholomew. 'The last time I saw him was at the church two Fridays ago. He was hiding behind one of the pillars. I thought he was playing around, but when I grabbed him from behind, he was terrified! He ran out, and I have not seen him since.'
Two Fridays before. That was three days after Philippa had become ill. So Abigny had not been impersonating her at least until then.
'Do you know where he went?' Bartholomew asked.
The tavern maid shook her head. 'I ran after him, but he had gone.'
The landlord shouted for her to serve other customers, and she left. Bartholomew thought about what she had told him: Abigny had been in the church at Trumpington terrified of something.
He tried to bring the general conversation round to what Abigny's reasons could be, but the suggestions were so outrageous that he knew no one had any solid facts to add.
Bartholomew and Gray talked with the locals for a while longer, and decided to stay with Edith for the night. Perhaps he would have more luck with his search tomorrow.
Gray was already up and admiring the horses in Stanmore's stable by the time Bartholomew awoke.
He threw open the window-shutters and looked out over the neat vegetable patches to the village church.
He could see the Gilbertine Canon, standing outside the porch talking to the early risers who had been to his morning mass. The weak winter sun was shining, glittering on the frost that lay over everything like a white sheet of gauze. Bartholomew took a deep breath, and the air was clean and fresh. He understood why Stanmore preferred not to live at the house in Milne Street so near the stinking ditches and waterways of Cambridge.
He went to the garderobes and broke the ice on a bowl of water. Shivering and swearing under his breath, he washed and shaved as fast as he could, and borrowed one of Stanmore's fresh shirts from the pile on the shelf in the corner. He went down to the kitchens, where a large fire blazed, and he and Edith sat on stools and discussed Philippa's disappearance. It seemed he could have saved himself a walk, because she had been busy on his behalf, collecting scraps of information from the Trumpington folk.
She, too, had spoken to the tavern girl, and had also questioned the Canon. He had told her that Abigny had frequented the church a great deal following Philippa's arrival. Abigny had seemed restless and agitated, and once the Canon had alarmed him by standing up suddenly from next to the altar where he had been meditating.
Abigny had turned so white that the Canon had been genuinely concerned for his health. The day after, he had disappeared. The Canon had assumed that Abigny had been waiting while Philippa was ill, and as soon as she was well again, he had returned to Michaelhouse.
'So,' said Edith, 'Giles may have been in the house pretending to be Philippa as early as the day her fever broke, since that was when either of them was last seen.
I do not understand why he did not just come here. He has stayed with us before.'
Bartholomew nodded in agreement.
'Of course,' she continued, 'since none of us actually saw Philippa once her fever had gone, there is no reason to assume that she was alone in the room.'
