A Corpse at St Andrew's Chapel

by Mel Starr

“Aye. Went straight to the Weald an’ his own hut an’ shut the door. I watched from near the bridge for a while, but he must’ve gone to ’is bed. Never saw ’im again.”

  “You have done well…although I admit I have no guess what it is you have discovered.”

  The beadle’s thoughts must have paralleled my own. His next words spoke his suspicion and worry. “Alan was found along t’road to chapel. Did he follow another man with a sack that night, you think?”

  “I thought ’twas a beast which drew him from town, when he was first found. But ’twas not. I will tell you a thing which you must tell no other, not even your wife. Not yet. Henry atte Bridge slew Alan.”

  “You are sure of this?” John replied with surprise. Even in the dim starlight I saw his eyebrows rise.

  “Aye. And now Henry’s brother travels the same lane in the dark of night, and the new beadle sees and follows.”

  “Would Thomas do to me as Henry did to Alan?”

  “He might, did he know what you have seen.”

  “So I must speak of this to no one, not even my wife,” John whispered.

  “Aye, until I can sort out this business you must appear ignorant of all we have spoken of this night.”

  “I am no scholar,” John chuckled. “Seeming ignorant is a thing I can do well. God has granted me the skill.”

  “Do not seek to learn more of Thomas atte Bridge. Complete your rounds tomorrow night as if all was as should be. We must not give Thomas cause to suspect us. I will devise some way to learn what the fellow is about.”

  Chapter 15

  I rose next morning at dawn and ate my breakfast loaf before the Angelus Bell tolled the beginning of the new day. I had notified the marshalsea that I would need Bruce this day early. He was saddled and waiting when I reached the stables. I tossed a pouch of herbs and surgical implements across his rump and led the old horse across the castle yard to the gatehouse, where Wilfred was about the business of cranking up the portcullis and swinging open the gate as I approached.

  I had looked forward to this day for more than a fortnight. Even a man of little wit will understand why this was so. I never before appreciated how slow Bruce’s ambling gait really was. My purpose was to remove the stitches I had used to seam Robert Caxton’s back. But Bruce would not have seemed so plodding had I not another goal: a meal prepared by and in company with a beautiful lass.

  It was well that I had business this day and so could not act on what I learned the night before from John Prudhomme. Bruce’s languorous pace gave opportunity to consider options at leisure as I watched the Oxfordshire countryside pass by. Could there be a greener and more pleasant place for a man to live his days? ’Tis not meet to be boastful of such a thing, for God could have set me in a desert, was that His wish. But He did not. For that I must remember to thank Him each day.

  In frustration I finally clucked to the old horse and gave him my heels in his ribs. Bruce responded. He broke into a lumbering gallop and I found myself bouncing from the saddle at frequent and regular intervals. How Lord Gilbert, clad in armor, stayed atop Bruce during a charge I know not.

  I tugged at the reins and Bruce slowed to his normal ambling walk. We had covered barely a hundred paces at a gallop. Had I allowed Bruce to continue, I would have arrived at Oxford so jostled and out of joint, I would have been of no use to Robert Caxton and his daughter would have thought me a cretin. I have new regard for knights who gallop into battle on ponderous destriers.

  Before Bruce clattered across the Oxpens Road Bridge I was convinced I knew what was in Thomas atte Bridge’s sack. The man was a poacher, I was certain of that. And certainly wrong, as I would soon learn.

  In the sack which he used to retrieve his booty from the forest he had taken a rabbit or joint of venison to John Kellet. Why he should do so I could not guess. And did his brother, Henry, embark on a similar mission to St Andrew’s Chapel the night Alan the beadle followed him and was slain? Would a man kill to preserve the secret of a gift? He might, was the gift unlawful. Did the priest of St Andrew’s Chapel know the source of the bounty? How could he not, delivered after curfew as it was, when all virtuous men should be abed?

  I left Bruce with the stableboy at the Stag and Hounds and set out through the mid-day throng for Holywell Street and Robert Caxton’s shop. Both door and shutters were open this fine day. Kate greeted me. Her father, she said, was preparing ink in the work room.

  The stationer overheard our conversation, for he appeared immediately at the door which separated the two rooms. He raised an ink-stained hand in greeting. “Ah, Master Hugh, we have been expecting you,” Caxton said, and glanced to his daughter. “Kate has been preparing since yesterday.”

  I regarded the girl, and was rewarded with a smile. And a faint blush, do I not mistake me.

  The stationer’s wound was well healed, and he was strong enough that he, not Kate, helped me haul his ink-stained table into the toft. The day was much warmer than when last I visited the toft, and Caxton had not the same worries he had when last he removed his cotehardie and kirtle in this place. He did not shiver, but lay willingly upon the table for me to begin my work.

  The seam along his rib was red, but showed no sign of putrescence. I asked him had it ever done so.

  “Nay…but for t’first days.”

  “And you feel no pain, as before?”

  “’Tis stiff, when I bend to put on a shoe, but not so as ’twas.”

  I carefully sliced each stitch and pulled the severed silk from the skin. A few small dots of blood appeared where the threads had been pulled free. I asked Kate for a clean cloth, and wiped away the traces of blood. No more followed.

  Caxton stood and stretched, then dressed, and together we dragged the table back to its place in the work room. Kate waited there with a white linen cloth which she proceeded to lay upon the table. Having done so, she transformed it into a dinner table. She then ushered me and her father from the room to the front of the shop. We were told that our meal would be ready shortly.

  We had already discussed the stationer’s healing wound. No new depths of that subject remained to be plumbed. The weather was fine, and had been so for many days. Foul weather makes a better subject for conversation than fair when other topics fail. Caxton and I sat on facing benches in a shop empty of customers and waited in awkward silence to be called to our dinner.

  The subject uppermost in both our minds was not the impending meal, but the future of the girl who prepared it. The stationer no doubt wondered of each new man in his daughter’s life if he would become the father of his grandchildren. For my part I thought on how I might arrange to visit the shop now that my surgical skill was no longer needed. I could return for more ink and parchment. But I should seem foolish were I to ride from Bampton for one more gathering every week or two. Perhaps it is the way of a young man who would court a maid – to appear foolish.

  Caxton finally broke the awkward silence. “Is all well on Lord Gilbert’s manor at Bampton?”

  ’Twas a question which could be answered with one word – either “Yes,” or “No.” But such an answer would not serve, for then silence would again settle over us like an autumn fog, with no rising sun in view to dissipate the cloud. The stationer was not so interested in affairs at Bampton as he was in ending the uncomfortable tranquility which enveloped the room.

  “Some things are well, others not,” I replied “Planting has gone well. There was enough rain, but not so much to interfere with plowing or rot the seed.”

  Caxton did not respond for a moment, then asked, “And what has not gone well?”

  I sketched for the man a brief outline of two mysteries which were given to me to solve: the murders of Alan and Henry.

  “So the death of the beadle was in your bailiwick, and you have solved that?”

  “Aye…so I believe.”

  “And the other man was a bishop’s tenant, but you are asked to find his slayer as well?”

  “Aye. The death is only
partly in my bailiwick. The dead man was the Bishop of Exeter’s man, but he died in Lord Gilbert’s forest to the north of town.”

  “And now you must deal with a poacher as well,” Caxton commiserated. “I must remember to thank God in my prayers that I am but a purveyor of ink and parchment and books. Yours is not work I would seek.”

  Kate appeared at the door to the work room and announced that our meal was ready. There were but two places set at the table. The girl would not eat with her father and me, but rather scurried about serving us. I protested but she would not hear, and bade me sit. I did. ’Twas not the last time I would find it prudent to obey her.

  Later, when I thought of the meal while swaying atop Bruce on my return to Bampton, I realized that the home probably possessed but two wooden trenchers, two pewter cups, and two each of dinner knives and silver spoons. Two of each would serve father and daughter. I am often mortified at how slow I am to understand such things. ’Tis well I did not press the girl, but obediently took my seat.

  In an iron pot hung over the fire Kate had baked a game pie, of chicken and rabbit, I believe. I have never eaten a better, and of this dish I ate enough that its quality was no mystery to me. There were also herb fritters fried in oil, and to finish the meal a cherry pottage, for which my groaning belly could barely find room. Cherries were a month from ripening. This pottage was made from fruit carefully dried and preserved for a year. I knew the trouble and expense which were ingredients of the dish.

  Kate watched me eat with, I think, much satisfaction, nor did she allow my cup to go dry, but poured more ale each time I raised it to my lips.

  When I was finished I thanked Kate much for the meal. This was necessary for good manners only, for surely she saw from my enthusiastic attack on the game pie that I approved her kitchen skills.

  As her father and I finished our cherry pottage we heard footsteps enter the shop. Caxton heaved himself to his feet with an overfed groan and passed through the door to serve his customer. I was left alone with Kate.

  Speaking the proper words to a lass is an art, not a skill. A skill may be taught. There is no course in the trivium or quadrivium to teach a man such competence. And if there was, who would teach it? Some bachelor scholar? I suppose ’twould not be the first time a master taught what he had learned from a book rather than from his own experience.

  An art is a talent from God, which a man may surely improve with practice and effort. God did not choose to bless me with this craft, nor did I find occasion to practice what little talent He did give. I could set Lady Joan Talbot’s broken wrist with skills I learned in study at Paris, but my conversation with the lady was clumsy. Had it been otherwise the outcome would have been no different. Our stations were too far apart. Sometimes even a God-given art may be insufficient.

  Robert Caxton left the room and there followed a silence more awkward than I had experienced in the shop. Kate busied herself at the cupboard while I considered whether or not to belch – to show my appreciation for the meal and to break the uneasy silence. I decided against it. This was good, for at that moment Kate came to my aid. She would do so many times, but this I could not at the moment know.

  “Do you return to Bampton today?” she asked.

  “No. ’Tis a long journey for an old horse.” I did not add, but could have, that it is also a long journey for a rump unaccustomed to a saddle. “And I have other business in Oxford. I have a matter to discuss with Master Wyclif.”

  It had occurred to me that the scholar might have an opinion regarding Thomas atte Bridge’s nocturnal visit to St Andrew’s Chapel. “There are empty rooms at New Canterbury Hall, where he is warden. He will permit me to stay in one this night, or I mistake me.”

  “I have heard of Master Wyclif,” Kate replied. “He is, uh, capable of some controversy.”

  “Aye. There are those who do not appreciate all he teaches,” I agreed.

  Kate is not a timid girl. “And you?” she asked. “Are you among them? Surely not,” she answered her own question, “else you would not seek him.”

  “You observe rightly. Master John is a scholar of great wit and insight.”

  “Is it his wit or his insight which leads to dispute?”

  “Ah…some men are contentious not because of what they say, but the way they say it. Their words are sharp. They take pleasure in wounding an opponent.”

  “And does this describe Master John?”

  “Not so,” I replied firmly. More firmly than was merited, I fear. Kate shifted her weight back on her feet, her eyes opened wide.

  “Master John,” I continued (softly, for I recognized my error), “is gentle with most who challenge him. He is mild with those of little learning, or who have been misled. But he can be hard on men who hold foolish views when they have the learning and opportunity to know better.”

  “Oh,” Kate nodded. The corners of her mouth lifted in a hint of a smile. “Who are these who should know better?”

  I did not immediately reply. The conversation had drifted to deep waters. But Kate plunged ahead. “I hear students speak of such things from time to time.”

  “And what do they say?”

  Kate smiled again. “It seems the pope and his bishops are not among Master John’s favorite people.”

  It was my turn to display a sardonic smile. “He is known to criticize churchmen from time to time. What do your customers think of this?”

  “Oh, he is a favorite among students who do business with my father.”

  “As when I was a student,” I concurred. “The young seem always willing to smash the temple idols.”

  “And so they should,” Kate replied with some vehemence. “Be it temple, cathedral, or chapel, an idol has no place.”

  “What idols seem most in danger these days…from the wrath of Master John’s young charges?”

  The girl screwed her lovely face into a mask of concentration. “Most likely they will decry the riches of pope and bishops. I heard one tell another that your Master Wyclif has said that a poor man need not contribute to the keep of a priest wealthier than he.”

  “Not a new thought with Master John,” I agreed. “He said much the same thing five years ago.”

  “He has worked no great change,” Kate observed. “I have not heard of the pope pleading poverty.”

  “Have you not? But he must be poor; he is always in need of money.”

  “True,” Kate smiled again. “They say the king’s brother is Master Wyclif’s champion at court.”

  “Aye. Prince John seeks to avoid sending funds to a pope in Avignon who is little more than a puppet of the French.”

  “Master Wyclif’s theology is useful for statecraft?” Kate concluded.

  “Aye. Today. What may be tomorrow or next year no man can know.”

  “He may fall from favor?”

  “He may…when he is useful no more.”

  “When will that be?”

  “When we no longer quarrel with the French, and the pope is no longer at Avignon, I think.”

  “Ah,” Kate laughed. “Then Master Wyclif will find friends at court for many years.”

  “You know much of the affairs of kings and ministers.”

  “I do but keep my ears open and my mouth closed,” Kate replied. “So those who have opinions speak them before me, thinking I am witless and will understand nothing. ’Tis common for students to think so…of a lass.”

  “Not all young men are so disposed. My mother was a wise woman. My father sought her advice often, and I and my brothers saw.”

  “And did she offer counsel even when he did not ask?”

  “That, too. But she was no termagant.”

  “How many brothers have you?”

  Our conversation, which began with hesitancy, flowed from politics to family. I learned that her mother had died when Kate was five years old. She had but little memory of her. Her mother and the child had died at the birth of a younger brother. Her grandfather was a stationer in Cambridg
e, and rather than wait to inherit the shop there, her father had decided to remove to Oxford and open his own business. He had talked to Baliol scholars and knew the crusty reputation which Aelfred had built for himself.

  I told Kate of growing up the youngest of four sons at the manor of Little Singleton, in Lancashire. I told her of netting eels from the Wyre, and watching plague strike my family. I told her of the return of plague four years past, and how the disease had provided the book which sent me to Paris and gave me a profession.

  “And now you have a murderer and a poacher to apprehend,” Kate added. “I heard your conversation with father while I prepared dinner.”

  I was reminded that, while I was sated, Kate had taken no dinner, but served me and her father. I was reluctant to leave, but if I was to present to Master John the matter of Thomas atte Bridge and his nocturnal visit to John Kellet, I must be away. And my departure would allow Kate to take some of the meal she had prepared but so far not enjoyed.

  Robert Caxton’s customer was no longer present. I found the stationer reading at his desk when I passed through the door from the work room. He had surely overheard the conversation between his daughter and me, but had chosen to take no part in it.

  There followed many thanks: I to Kate and her father for the meal, they to me for treating Caxton’s wounded back. As I took the shop door latch in hand I turned to ask if I might call when next I was in Oxford. Of course, a man may call at a place of business any time he will without asking, and be welcome for his trade. But I wanted both father and daughter to know that business would not be my reason – at least, not my only reason – to visit Holywell Street when next I traveled to Oxford. These words I did not have opportunity to say. Kate spoke first.

  “Master Hugh,” she said softly, as I turned from the door, “I will take it amiss should you visit Oxford some future day and do not call.”

  Behind Kate, over her shoulder, I saw her father nod agreement. I promised that I would be obedient to the girl’s command, said a last farewell, and set off down Holywell Street with a heavy stomach and light heart.