But if the Oxford plot was a sham, why did Colet want the seal? Bartholomew rubbed his arms hard, trying to force some warmth into them. He supposed it was to add credence to the Oxford plot, to show that the business was worth killing over. He wondered what the Oxford scholars thought about the business. He had no doubt that the rumours had reached them, and that they must be as mystified by the whole affair as were the Cambridge men. Perhaps they had even initiated their own investigation, word of which would filter back to Cambridge, where it would be used by Swynford to underline further still that something untoward was happening.
So when did it all start? Bartholomew thought back to what Aelfrith had told him about the uncannily high number of deaths of Fellows in the Colleges last year:
Aelfrith's friend who had drowned in the Peterhouse fish-ponds, supposedly in his cups; the Master of King's Hall who was said to have fallen down the stairs; two deaths from food poisoning; and four cases of summer ague. So Aelfrith's assumptions had been correct, and the Fellows had been murdered by Swynford and his associates so they could start a rumour discrediting the Colleges and blaming Oxford for the deaths. Aelfrith's friend had been drowned, the Master of King's Hall hanged, and the others probably poisoned. He thought of the two young men he had attended as they lay dying from bad oysters. He closed his eyes in the darkness as he recalled who had been with him. Colet. Colet had been dining at Clare that night, and it had been Colet who had called Bartholomew so it would seem that he had made every effort to save their lives. Clever Colet, using Bartholomew as a shield so no blame for the deaths should ever fall on him. And of course, who better to have access to subtle poisons, and to know how to use them, than a physician?
These deaths, it seemed, had been sufficient to force the merchants into action. When the so-called hostels group was formed, Stanmore had said that the deaths had stopped. The merchants must have felt that their financial contributions were doing some good. But why kill Sir John and the others if the merchants had fallen for the ploy and were paying their money? Bartholomew rolled the possibilities through his mind. The merchants must have grown complacent, secure in the knowledge that they had done their bit for the town. Perhaps news of the plague took their minds away from the University.
The deaths at Michaelhouse would serve to show them that the business was far from over.
But what of Augustus? Who had killed him? It was obvious why: Wilson had told him that Sir John had visited Augustus before attending the fatal meeting that Bartholomew now knew was with Colet, and half the world suspected that the seal had been hidden in his room. The first attempt on Augustus's life had failed, and the killer had returned three nights later. Bartholomew supposed that Augustus's room could hardly be searched with Augustus in it, and he had been murdered to secure his silence. Poor Augustus had given the killer reason to believe he had swallowed the seal. The killer must have hidden in the attic when Alexander came to bring Paul and Augustus some wine. He must have been watching Bartholomew from his hiding place, wondering what he had been doing when he examined Augustus's body and looked under the bed. When Aelfrith had come to keep vigil, it had been an easy thing to knock him on the head and drag Augustus into the attic. Wilson had come then to begin his own search for the seal, and he too had fled to the attic when disturbed, first knocking Bartholomew down the stairs. How crowded the attic had been at that point: the killer, Wilson, and Augustus's body.
But who had actually killed Augustus? And how?
There had been no signs of poisoning or violence, but the expression of abject terror on his dead face confirmed that his death had not been natural. All the Fellows and commoners had alibis for the time Augustus had died, so it must have been an outsider. Could it have been Colet again? Bartholomew thought about it, and decided there was no other plausible possibility. Whoever had sliced Augustus apart to investigate his innards had possessed some degree of surgical skill. The incision was crude and brutal, but it would take a physician's knowledge to search the inside of a corpse, and perhaps a physician's nerve and stomach.
So Colet must have determined, with the help of Swynford and perhaps jocelyn, to search Augustus's room for the elusive seal while Michaelhouse scholars were at Wilson's feast. Poor Brother Paul was too ill to attend, something that Colet had probably not anticipated. So, Paul was dispatched as a precaution against him crying out. Bartholomew screwed up his eyes in thought. When he had gone to check Augustus, he had heard Paul cough, but now he could not be sure that it had not been Colet, standing next to Paul's bed, and imitating the hack of an old man to prevent Bartholomew from checking on hirn too. But even if Bartholomew had looked at Paul, what then? He would have seen exactly what he had seen the following morning — Paul with his blanket tightly tucked around him hiding his face, the spilled blood, and the knife in his stomach.
Drugged wine was left in the commoners' room, lest they returned from the feast too early. And Jocelyn had told Bartholomew that it had been his idea to drink Wilson's health with the wine he had found on the table. He must have known it was drugged, and also that the others were too drunk to question how the wine had come to be there so conveniently. How Jocelyn must have gloated at the ease with which that part of the plan had gone. Montfitchet did not want to drink because he felt ill, but, luckily for Jocelyn, Father Jerome persuaded him, unwittingly bringing about his death. D'Evene, who had a bad reaction to wine, had also been persuaded to drink.
Bartholomew stood and began jumping up and down on the spot, trying to force some warmth into his legs. As he considered the information he had, it was easy to see what Colet had done. He must have hidden in Swynford's room. Swynford was the only Fellow to have a room to himself, so no one would have seen Colet once he had slipped into the College in the commotion before the feast. He could then have used the second trap-door in the hallway outside Swynford's room to gain access to the attic, and gone from there to Augustus's room.
But how did Colet know about the doors to the attic? Wilson had said they were a secret passed from Master to Master. Wilson himself did not know about them until he read about them in the box from the Chancellor.
Try as he might, Bartholomew could come up with no reason why Swynford or Colet should know, and he felt his carefully constructed argument begin to crumble.
He could not imagine that Sir John would have broken trust by telling Swynford, and Swynford had not been at Michaelhouse long enough to have known the previous Master. Exhausted by his thinking and the events of the day, Bartholomew finally slipped into a restless doze huddled in a corner.
Bartholomew lost track of the time he was kept in his underground tomb. Once the door opened briefly and some bread, salted beef, and watered ale were shoved inside, but it occurred so quickly that by the time Bartholomew realised what had happened, the door had been closed and he was alone again. He sniffed at the food suspiciously, wondering if Colet meant to poison him, but he was hungry and thirsty enough to throw caution to the wind.
He thought about what his death might mean. Colet had said in Bene't Hostel that it would fit nicely into their plan, and would reinforce the notion that something was sadly amiss at Michaelhouse. What of Stanmore then? He would never accept Bartholomew's murder, no matter how cunningly disguised. He would try to seek out Bartholomew's killer, would confront members of the hostel committee, and generally make problems until he, too, was dispatched. And then Richard would guess something untoward had happened, and perhaps start an inexperienced, clumsy investigation of his own.
Where would it all end? Would Stanmore's colleagues be suspicious of three accidental deaths in one family?
Would they, too, start to look into matters?
Bartholomew recalled with a pang why he had been captured in the first place — trying to warn Stanmore that Stephen and Burwell planned to kill him. He cursed himself again for his ineptitude. He had seen Stephen wearing that cloak before. But the more he thought about it, the more he came to believe that Stanmore would be safe until his own body was found. Stanmore had no reason to be suspicious of Bartholomew's disappearance — since the plague had come he had kept such irregular hours that no one knew for certain where he was — and the hostel group was unlikely to cut off a source of funding in Stanmore before it became absolutely necessary.
He was dozing in the corner when the room was suddenly filled with light that hurt his eyes. There was noise too — shouting and arguing. Through painfully narrowed eyes, Bartholomew saw Swynford outlined in the doorway, flanked by a burly porter from Rudde' s Hostel who was armed with a loaded crossbow. Irrelevantly, Bartholomew remembered Colet telling him that the porter was a veteran of the King's wars in France before exchanging a soldier's career for a more sedentary life keeping law and order in one of the University's rowdier establishments.
Swynford held up the torch and the light fell on Bartholomew. Bartholomew squinted, wondering if they had come to murder him. He struggled to his feet, dazed and clumsy, but prepared to sell his life dearly. Swynford
