Bartholomew 11 - The Mark Of A Murderer

by Susanna GREGORY

  ‘True. But why are they skulking over there, rather than standing in the nave with the rest of us?’

  ‘They are not skulking. I imagine they are keeping their distance because Wormynghalle does not want another awkward encounter with his unmannerly namesake.’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ said Spryngheuse, relieved. He rubbed his mouth with shaking fingers, while Bartholomew raised his hand in greeting and the King’s Hall men returned his salute with friendly smiles. ‘But what shall I do? How can I be rid of this spectre that is so determined to drive me from my wits?’

  ‘Stay with Duraunt,’ suggested Bartholomew, wondering whether Spryngheuse might benefit from a sojourn with Brother Paul and Clippesby at Stourbridge. ‘He will not—’

  ‘Why would Duraunt protect me? He lost loved friends in the riot, too. But you are a physician. Will you calculate my horoscope and tell me when the Black Monk plans to strike? I have my dates written out, and you can borrow the tanner’s astrolabe . . . no, you cannot. It is missing.’

  ‘Someone has stolen it?’

  ‘For its metal, presumably. But it is no great loss, scientifically speaking. Astrolabes are better made of brass than silver, and this one is hopelessly inaccurate – made for display, rather than use.’

  ‘Did Dodenho reclaim it?’ wondered Bartholomew. ‘It was his to start with.’

  Spryngheuse did not understand the question, but nor did he care. ‘Will you help me?’ he asked desperately. ‘I do not think I can stand the anticipation much longer.’

  ‘I cannot predict when you will die,’ said Bartholomew gently. ‘No one can, not even with the best astrolabe in the world.’

  ‘I visited a wise woman yesterday, and she said it would be soon, but refused to tell me the exact day. She said there is a black shadow following me – Death in the guise of a Benedictine.’

  ‘She was guessing. You look like a man at the end of his tether, and she used it to make her so-called prediction. Fight this, Spryngheuse. Or leave Cambridge and go to some remote village where you can use a different name and no one will know who you are.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Spryngheuse wearily. ‘That is what I should do. The only problem is finding the courage to ride off alone, to somewhere the monk will never find me.’

  ‘Enough!’ roared Michael suddenly. The merchants’ quarrel had reached screeching proportions. ‘You have lied to me and misled me, and nothing can change that. But I do not want to talk about Gonerby today. I want to talk about Okehamptone, who was also foully murdered.’

  There was a tense silence, as the party from Oxford digested this information. Bartholomew watched them carefully, but their faces told him nothing he could not have predicted: Spryngheuse, Duraunt and Abergavenny were shocked, Polmorva and Eu were unreadable, and Wormynghalle was incensed, seeing the statement as an accusation that somehow besmirched his personal integrity.

  ‘Okehamptone died of a fever, Brother,’ said Duraunt eventually. ‘You said so yourself.’

  ‘I have reconsidered in the light of new evidence,’ replied Michael. ‘So, what have you to say?’

  ‘There is nothing to say,’ said Polmorva. ‘Okehamptone was hired as the merchants’ scribe, and he died when we arrived in Cambridge. Fever deaths are not uncommon after long journeys.’

  ‘England’s roads are dangerous, Brother,’ Abergavenny pointed out. ‘It is not just outlaws who present a risk, but sicknesses caused by rotten food, cloudy ale, dangerous animals, filthy beds . . .’

  ‘Strange whores,’ added Eu. ‘My father always taught me never to romp with harlots I do not know personally. Of course, getting acquainted with them first is not always—’

  ‘Bad water killed Okehamptone,’ declared Wormynghalle. ‘He drank from streams and wells, when the rest of us took ale. I warned him it was foolish, but he would not listen.’

  ‘Where did he drink this tainted water?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘How long before he died?’

  ‘He was always doing it,’ replied Wormynghalle. ‘He disliked the flavour of ale, although he adored wine. He gulped a vast quantity of well-water in a village called Girton, and was feverish that same night. It is obvious what killed him.’

  ‘Not Girton’s well,’ said Bartholomew immediately. ‘It is good—’

  ‘Did Okehamptone have enemies?’ asked Michael, before his friend could hold forth on the topic of water.

  ‘No,’ said Eu, surprised by the question. ‘We have already told you: we hired him because he was likeable. He had a habit of gabbling Latin with Chesterfelde, which was annoying . . .’

  ‘And he sang,’ added Polmorva. ‘All the time. Now that was really irritating. He was always a tone below where he should have been, and it was hard on the ear.’

  ‘Anything else? Was he quarrelsome? Aggressive?’ Michael fixed Eu with a stare. ‘Pompous?’

  ‘He was a scholar-scribe,’ said Abergavenny before Eu could respond. ‘So, of course he was pompous. But, as Eu said, he was a pleasant fellow – not wealthy, but his clothes were of a decent quality and he was clean.’

  ‘And that cannot always be said of scholars,’ added Eu, determined to have his say. He did not look at anyone, but Bartholomew assumed he was thinking of Tynkell.

  ‘You say he was murdered,’ said Duraunt when Michael looked indignant. ‘How do you know?’

  ‘That is a good question,’ said Polmorva. ‘What have you done? Been to the church and dragged the poor man from his coffin?’

  Duraunt turned appalled eyes on Bartholomew. ‘Please tell me you did not disturb a man’s mortal remains. I know there are universities in Italy that condone that sort of unchristian behaviour, but I thought English schools were above such barbarism – especially scholars I once taught.’

  ‘Of course they have been in Okehamptone’s grave,’ said Eu. ‘How else could they have “new evidence”? They cannot solve Chesterfelde’s murder, so they have turned to Okehamptone instead, in an attempt to prevent us from finding Gonerby’s killer – to muddy the waters.’

  ‘Okehamptone died from an injury to his throat,’ stated Michael baldly.

  ‘His throat?’ breathed Duraunt, shocked. ‘I did not see anything amiss with his throat.’

  ‘Did you look?’ Michael pounced.

  ‘Well, no, but—’

  ‘Then someone must have invaded Merton Hall during the night and killed him,’ said Polmorva with a shrug, to indicate he considered the matter of scant importance. ‘He was alive when we went to bed, but dead by dawn.’

  ‘Wormynghalle provided us with a casket of wine the night Okehamptone died,’ recalled Duraunt. ‘He drank some of that, but we all did. Besides, wine does not wound a throat.’

  ‘It was our first night here, and I felt we should celebrate our safe arrival,’ said Wormynghalle, a little defensively. ‘Duraunt will accept no coins for our board, so I decided to repay his hospitality in time-honoured fashion.’

  ‘Just like the night Chesterfelde died,’ said Michael pointedly. ‘You provided wine, then, too.’

  ‘That was claret,’ said Duraunt, as if such a detail made all the difference. ‘We had white wine when Okehamptone was …taken to God.’

  ‘Did anyone see blood on his body?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘There would have been a lot of it.’

  ‘He was wrapped in a blanket and he wore Wormynghalle’s liripipe for warmth against his fever,’ said Abergavenny thoughtfully. ‘We did not notice blood, because we did not unwrap him. All we did was cover his face and summon the appropriate authorities.’

  ‘Wormynghalle’s liripipe?’ asked Michael, turning to the tanner with questioning eyes.

  ‘He did not ask to borrow it,’ said Wormynghalle, a little angrily. ‘But once he had died in it, I did not want it back. I do not wear clothes that have been donned by corpses.’ He gazed at Eu in a way that suggested he would not put such grotesque behaviour past him.

  ‘And none of you touched the body?’ Michael asked, cutting across Eu’s angry retort
. ‘No one anointed it with holy water, dressed it in clean clothes?’

  ‘We did what was required of us,’ replied Polmorva coolly. ‘No more, but no less, either.’

  ‘You are a friar,’ said Bartholomew to Duraunt. ‘Surely you gave him last rites?’

  ‘He was dead,’ replied Duraunt. ‘I know some clerics believe a soul lingers after death, but I am not among them. I feel it is wrong to place holy things near corpses, and Okehamptone had been dead for some time before we found him. He was stiff and cold.’

  ‘Since the pestilence, we are all wary of cadavers,’ added Wormynghalle. ‘There are rumours that it originated when an earthquake burst open graves, and I, for one, refuse to touch them. We had Okehamptone removed as soon as your other Corpse Examiner had finished his business.’

  ‘Wormynghalle is right,’ agreed Abergavenny. ‘You cannot be too careful these days, and we were only too happy to let others deal with Okehamptone’s remains. None of us knew him well, but we attended his requiem mass and prayed for his soul. We did all that was expected of us.’

  ‘Except notice that his throat had been cut,’ said Bartholomew in disgust.

  * * *

  That afternoon, Bartholomew concentrated on his teaching, grateful to relegate the Oxford murders to the back of his mind for a while. Since the plague, physicians had been in desperately short supply, and there was a huge demand for qualified men to fill empty posts. Bartholomew felt it was his duty to train as many students as he could, and was hard-pressed to supervise them all, even when he was not helping Michael. He was more than happy to spend time in Michaelhouse, his apprentice medics perched on wooden benches in front of him, as he vied to make himself heard over the other lessons that were taking place. William was a particular nuisance, with his loud voice and bigoted opinions, and it was invariably a challenge to keep the students’ attention once the Franciscan was in full swing. That morning, William had taken it upon himself to hold forth about the Dominicans again.

  ‘Dominican,’ he announced in a bellow, as soon as the bell had rung to announce the lectures’ start. Michael and his quiet theologians jumped in alarm at the sudden yell, while Bartholomew’s lively youngsters nudged each other and grinned, anticipating that they were going to be in for a treat. Langelee raised his eyes heavenward, while Wynewyk sighed in irritation.

  ‘Yesterday, you were read Galen’s theories relating to black bile,’ said Bartholomew, to regain his class’s attention. He spotted a number of guilty glances, and was not pleased to think that some had evidently been less attentive to their studies than they should have been. ‘What are they?’

  A pregnant silence greeted his question, and Bartholomew saw several lads bow their heads to write on scraps of parchment. Since he had not yet said anything worthy of being noted, he assumed it was a ruse to avoid catching his eye.

  ‘Domini. Can,’ bawled William. ‘From the Latin Domini, meaning our Lord, and canna, meaning dog.’ The sinister emphasis he gave to the last noun indicated that he did not consider it a flattering term. Bartholomew regarded him uncertainly, not sure whether he had used the wrong Latin intentionally, to test whether his students were paying attention, or whether he had made a mistake. One eager Franciscan immediately raised a hand, and the fact that William ignored him suggested the error was a genuine one, and that he did not want to be side-tracked by linguistic niceties.

  ‘Flies do not like it,’ said Deynman brightly from the front of Bartholomew’s class.

  The physician dragged his attention away from William. ‘What?’

  ‘Flies do not like black bile,’ repeated Deynman patiently. ‘They think it tastes like the Dead Sea.’

  ‘And we all know about dogs!’ boomed William in a voice loud enough to make the windows shake. ‘Disgusting creatures!’

  ‘Lord!’ muttered Langelee, looking up from where he was writing something on a wax tablet for some of the younger scholars.

  Bartholomew glared at his best student, Falmeresham, who was laughing in a way that made others smile, too. He could not tell whether the lad was finding William or Deynman more amusing.

  ‘Galen said most creatures avoid black bile, just as they do saturated brine,’ Bartholomew explained, to correct Deynman’s misinterpretation before the other students could write it down as fact. ‘Excessive salt is poisonous to life, and—’

  ‘I do not think the sea tastes of black bile,’ said Falmeresham to Deynman, puzzled. ‘I have tasted seawater myself, and it is nothing like it.’

  ‘You should not drink bile!’ exclaimed Deynman in horror. ‘Did you not listen to the reading yesterday? It is a deadly poison and an excess of it causes all manner of ills. Besides, I referred to the Dead Sea, not any old ocean. You have not tasted the Dead Sea, so you cannot know whether it has the same flavour as black bile or not.’

  ‘Dogs push their noses into the groins of passers-by and fornicate whenever the mood takes them,’ ranted William, causing Michael’s Benedictines to exchange shocked glances and Wynewyk to falter in his pedantic analysis of Roman law. Bartholomew saw he was losing the attention of his own students again: Deynman frowned as he absorbed the friar’s statement with the same seriousness that he applied to all his lessons, while Falmeresham began to snigger a second time. So did Michael.

  ‘Name one of the diseases caused by an excess of black bile,’ Bartholomew said quickly.

  ‘Melancholy,’ said Deynman. Bartholomew gaped at him. ‘What is the matter? Am I wrong?’

  ‘You are right,’ said Bartholomew, trying to regain his composure. He did not add that it was one of the few correct answers Deynman had ever given, and felt a sudden lifting of his spirits. His jubilation was not to last.

  ‘And they eat the excrement of other animals,’ raved William, pacing back and forth as he worked himself into a frenzy.

  ‘They do not!’ objected Falmeresham. He kept a hound himself, and was fond of it. ‘Dogs just like the smell.’

  ‘Pay attention to your own lesson,’ snapped William. ‘We are discussing theology here, not medicine, and it is too lofty a discipline for your feeble mind to comprehend. Besides, I am not talking about dogs, I am talking about Dominicans.’

  ‘They do not eat excrement, either,’ argued Falmeresham.

  ‘People are always melancholic when they have an excess of black bile,’ elaborated Deynman, pleased he had his teacher’s approval. Bartholomew struggled to ignore the burgeoning debate between Falmeresham and William, to concentrate on what his student was saying. ‘And that is because they are distressed over the loss of their haemorrhoids.’

  Bartholomew closed his eyes. Deynman’s brief foray into accurate understanding had been too good to be true. Once again, certain points had stuck in his mind, but had then rearranged themselves in a way that allowed him to draw some very bizarre conclusions.

  ‘Dominicans are afflicted with haemorrhoids,’ declared William matter-of-factly, indicating that he was listening to other lectures, too, as he cut across Falmeresham’s spirited defence of dogs and Dominicans alike. ‘It comes from sitting in cold, dark places while they plot their satanic acts. And that is what makes them morose and melancholy.’

  ‘Galen says that the removal of organs that contain blood – such as veins and haemorrhoids – might cause black bile to get the upper hand in the balance of the humours and bring about melancholy,’ said Falmeresham, deciding that taking issue with William was a lost cause. ‘He is referring to a loss of vessels causing the imbalance; he is not saying patients become depressed because they are sorry to see their haemorrhoids go.’

  ‘Dominicans are proud of these marks,’ William went on. ‘It is the communal suffering they endure that makes their brotherhood so powerful. After all, what more shameful secret can you share than intimate knowledge of each other’s haemorrhoids?’

  ‘I cannot teach in here,’ said Bartholomew abruptly, gathering his books and heading for the door, indicating that his students were to follow. ‘I am
going to the orchard. It may be cold and it may even rain, but at least I will not have to do battle with this kind of rubbish.’

  ‘Dominicans such as Clippesby,’ said William loudly, ‘who lounges comfortably in his hospital, while his hapless colleagues are compelled to do his work.’

  ‘Is that the reason for Clippesby’s absence?’ asked Deynman, wide eyed. ‘Haemorrhoids? I thought it was insanity.’

  ‘I will come with you, Matthew,’ announced William, preparing to follow the physician outside. ‘It is too hot in here. Besides, I will be able to speak properly in the orchard – I am tired of being forced to whisper all the time.’

  Langelee gave a startled gulp of laughter, which encouraged his students to join in, and the hall was soon filled with hoots and guffaws, while William’s face expressed his total bemusement.

  ‘He really has no idea,’ said Wynewyk to Bartholomew in wonderment. ‘Is he quite normal, do you think? He accuses Clippesby of madness, but there are times when I think he is worse.’

  ‘You go,’ said Langelee to William, stepping forward to take control and wiping tears from his eyes. ‘You are right, Father. It is stuffy in here, and it is a shame you are obliged to speak softly. Sit in the orchard and expound your theories so they can be properly heard.’

  ‘They will be heard in Ely,’ said Michael in alarm, as the friar left with his reluctant students in tow. ‘And worse, at the Dominican convent! We will have enraged Black Friars at our gates within an hour, and you know how keen I am to keep the peace until the Visitation is over.’

  ‘The Dominicans are perfectly aware that William’s opinions do not represent our own,’ said Langelee, relieved to have the Franciscan gone. ‘Besides, would you really object if they silenced him by force? I would not. He is becoming a liability with his stupid ideas and braying voice. Perhaps we should summon a few Dominicans to shut him up – preferably before he has an opportunity to regale the Archbishop with his nasty theories.’