To Kill or Cure: The Thirteenth Chronicle Of Matthew Bartholomew (The Chronicles of Matthew Bartholomew)

by Gregory, Susanna

  ‘Yes, magic,’ Falmeresham flashed back. ‘Science cannot explain everything – in fact, it does not explain much at all, and raises more questions than answers. You are always saying the workings of the human body are mysteries science has not yet unravelled, but Arderne has solutions to everything, and it is refreshing. Do you want to see him, or are you here to debate with me?’

  ‘What a shame,’ said Michael, watching him go. ‘Arderne will ruin him – fill his head with nonsense and superstition.’

  ‘I should have anticipated this,’ said Bartholomew. ‘He is frustrated when he asks questions that I cannot answer, and it must be exhilarating to find someone with solutions at his fingertips.’

  ‘And that is the real pity,’ said Michael sadly. ‘His new source of knowledge runs foul and dark.’

  Arderne kept Bartholomew and Michael waiting longer than was polite, and when he arrived, he was wiping his lips on the back of his hand, indicating that he had finished feeding before going to see what the Senior Proctor and his Corpse Examiner wanted. Michael had been on the verge of leaving, but Bartholomew had persuaded him to stay, sensing that there were answers to be gleaned from the sinister healer. Both scholars were surprised to see Isabel St Ives behind Arderne. She was dressed, but her long hair cascaded freely down her shoulders, and looked tousled from sleep. Even Bartholomew, not the most observant of men when it came to romantic dalliances, could tell she had spent the night.

  ‘Should you not be with your mistress?’ Michael asked.

  The smile faded from Isabel’s face. ‘She died yesterday, so I am now without a home. However, Magister Arderne has a vacancy for a good nurse, so we have been discussing terms.’

  ‘I see,’ said Michael, eyeing her disarrayed appearance pointedly. ‘Well, I am sorry about Maud. She was a good woman. She made lovers of our scholars, but at least she was discreet about it.’

  ‘What do you want, monk?’ asked Arderne coldly. ‘A cure for gluttony? A miracle that will melt away your fat and render you slim again?’

  ‘I am not a glutton,’ said Michael, startled. ‘And I am not fat, either. I just have big bones.’

  ‘Speaking of misdiagnoses, you gave Tyrington a remedy for spitting,’ said Bartholomew, cutting across Arderne’s bray of laughter. ‘It contained bryony.’

  ‘Mandrake,’ corrected Arderne, while Falmeresham frowned in puzzlement. ‘I would never use bryony, because it causes gripes. I used mandrake, which has secret properties, as we all know. Traditional medicine has not unlocked many of its marvels, but I know the plant well enough to be familiar with its benefits. It will cure Tyrington’s unseemly slobbering.’

  ‘You might have killed him,’ said Bartholomew, disgusted. ‘First you prescribe urine to Hanchach, and now some toxic potion to Tyrington.’

  Falmeresham gaped at him. ‘Urine? But Hanchach’s health is too fragile for—’

  ‘What I do is none of your affair, physician,’ snarled Arderne. ‘Leave me and my patients alone, or I shall prescribe something that will make you wish you had never been born.’

  ‘Threats to cause harm?’ asked Michael archly. ‘That is hardly what one expects from a healer.’

  ‘You can take it how you will,’ grated Arderne. ‘Now get out of my house.’

  Falmeresham was dismayed. ‘Please,’ he said, stepping forward and attempting a placatory grin. His frustration at Bartholomew’s inability to answer medical questions did not mean he was prepared to stand by while his former mentor was insulted. ‘There is no need for hostility. We are all interested in the same thing: making people well.’

  ‘Is that so?’ said Arderne. ‘Then why do University physicians lose so many patients? A dozen deaths have occurred in the few weeks since I arrived, all of which could have been prevented. Cambridge will be better off when these academics pack their bags and leave me in charge.’

  ‘Where were you last night?’ asked Bartholomew, not deigning to reply. He thought of Edith, and itched to punch the man. He was not often given to violent urges and was astonished by the strength of the rage he felt towards Arderne.

  ‘Here,’ said Arderne, reaching out to touch Isabel’s hair. She blushed furiously at the display of public affection, and pulled away awkwardly. Then he fixed her with his pale eyes, and she gazed back, like a rabbit caught in the glare of a lantern.

  ‘We were all here,’ elaborated Falmeresham. ‘Magister Arderne taught me a new way to cure infections of the eyes, and Isabel was listening. Why do you ask?’

  ‘Because Motelete is dead,’ said Michael.

  Arderne shrugged. ‘So I heard, but I am not his keeper. What does it have to do with me?’

  Michael found his attitude irritating. ‘Someone was pawing his corpse in the churchyard of St Mary the Great, and I wondered whether anyone here might have something to say about it.’

  ‘Such as what?’ asked Arderne, affecting a bored look.

  ‘Such as whether you poisoned him,’ Michael flashed back. ‘Or whether you tried to raise him from the dead a second time, and ran away like a coward when you were almost caught.’

  ‘It is all right, lad,’ said Arderne, when Falmeresham stepped forward angrily. The ex-student might dislike Arderne insulting Bartholomew, but that did not mean he was willing to remain silent while Michael hurled accusations at his new master. ‘I am used to enduring this sort of rubbish from disbelievers, and I usually treat them with the contempt they deserve by ignoring them.’

  ‘You had better go,’ said Falmeresham to the scholars. He was struggling to control his temper. ‘I would not have let you in, had I known you were going to be rude.’

  ‘What about the people outside?’ asked Bartholomew of Arderne. ‘Are you going to leave them there all day? It is raining, and none are dressed for standing around in the cold.’

  ‘I have suggested they go home,’ replied Arderne, ‘but they remain hopeful of one of my cures. I do not mind them there, because they advertise my trade nicely, and I may deign to heal one later. I do not usually bother with the poor, but they are doing me a service, after all.’

  He turned and walked away. Isabel trotted after him like an obedient dog, without so much as a nod to the scholars as she left. Bartholomew wondered whether Arderne had put her in some sort of trance; certainly her behaviour was not normal.

  ‘I am pleased you are learning so many new things,’ he said to Falmeresham, as the student escorted them to the door. He felt no resentment towards the lad, only sadness that he had proved to be so gullible. He supposed he should have trained him to be less credulous of men who claimed to have all the answers. ‘However, I hope Arderne’s attitude to the poor is not one of them.’

  ‘You could learn from him, too, if you would open your mind. You have no idea of the extent of his powers. I admit he has his faults, but I am willing to overlook them in the pursuit of knowledge.’

  ‘Was Arderne telling us the truth about last night?’ asked Bartholomew, declining to discuss it. ‘Was he really in the whole time?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Falmeresham. ‘He really was. We sat by the fire with Isabel, and he held forth about ailments of the eyes. Did you know that lost sight can be restored simply by licking the eyeball?’

  ‘I know it is a remedy favoured by witches, but it does not work. And neither does rubbing a gold ring across the eye’s surface, if he included that particular trick in his discourse, too.’

  Falmeresham sighed irritably. ‘You do not know what you are missing by refusing to acknowledge his skills.’ He slammed the door with considerable vigour, thus ending the discussion.

  ‘And was Falmeresham telling the truth?’ asked Michael, as he and Bartholomew walked back along the High Street. ‘He knows his new master is not perfect, but that is a long way from seeing through him. He may well fabricate tales to ensure Arderne is not charged with Motelete’s murder.’

  Bartholomew shrugged, not sure what to think. ‘He has never lied to me before.’

  ‘The
n what about Falmeresham as the killer? He poisoned Motelete because he resented the attention Arderne gave him – and because he stole from his hero. Despite his claim that the pots in Arderne’s dispensary are empty, there are still toxic substances to hand, because you said there was bryony in the remedy he gave Tyrington. Could bryony have killed Motelete?’

  ‘Yes – it would be in keeping with the blisters I saw. But it is not difficult to come by, and I imagine most households have a supply of it, to cure coughs, spots and wounds.’

  ‘So the visit to Arderne did not tell us much?’ asked Michael, disappointed.

  ‘It told me I would like to make him try some of his remedies.’

  That afternoon, when the rain stopped and the sun came out, Bartholomew went to visit patients. There were two cases of fever among the ragged folk who inhabited makeshift shacks in the north of the town, but other than Blankpayn howling abuse, his journey was mercifully uneventful. He prescribed his usual tonic for agues, and then walked to the Dominican convent, where the prior was complaining of backache. The Black Friars were a hospitable group, and plied him with wine and cakes, so by the time he left, he had overeaten and was slightly drunk. It was not a pleasant sensation, and he wondered how Michael and Paxtone could bear doing it day after day. He returned home via the Barnwell Gate, keeping his temper admirably when the soldier on duty pretended not to recognise him and demanded proof of his identity.

  ‘You know me, John Shepherd,’ he said mildly, aware that a queue was building behind him and that the delay was being perceived as his fault. ‘I set your mother’s broken wrist last year.’

  Shepherd glanced around furtively, then spoke in a testy whisper. ‘Of course I know you, but we are under orders to question everyone in a scholar’s tabard or a religious habit. If I do not do as I am told, I will be reported.’

  ‘Orders from whom? The Sheriff is away.’

  ‘And that is the problem,’ said Shepherd in disgust. ‘Tulyet would never have issued such a stupid instruction. It comes from the burgesses, led by Candelby. They are making a point.’

  ‘What point is that?’

  ‘That the town has control over some matters, and will make a nuisance of itself if scholars do not yield to its demands. But I have delayed you enough to make it look good, so you are free to go.’ Shepherd lowered his voice further still. ‘I could lose my job for telling you this, but warn Brother Michael that there is a move afoot to set fire to the University Church.’

  Bartholomew groaned. ‘Not again! We have only just finished repairing it from the last time it was attacked, and a big building like that is expensive. Do you know when it will happen?’

  ‘Monday, probably. Stop it if you can. My house backs on to its cemetery, and when it goes up in flames, soot lands on my wife’s best cushions. She is getting a bit tired of it.’

  Unsettled, Bartholomew went on his way. When he reached the High Street, he saw Paxtone and Rougham. Paxtone was looking unwell again, and was rubbing his stomach. Bartholomew knew how he felt, because he was suffering from the same heavy, bloated feeling himself.

  ‘You two are in each other’s company a good deal these days,’ he remarked as they approached.

  ‘They are in my company a good deal, too,’ said Robin, peering out from behind Paxtone. The surgeon was small, and Bartholomew had not noticed him behind the physician’s bulk. ‘It is safer that way, and if you had any sense, you would join us.’

  ‘We have formed an alliance,’ explained Paxtone. ‘Cambridge practitioners versus Arderne – or, to put it another way, honest medici against a leech.’

  ‘Arderne attacked us without provocation or cause,’ added Rougham. ‘So, we have decided the best way to combat him is by standing together. Did you know he claims to have cured Hanchach of laboured breathing when you had failed?’

  ‘He did not cure Hanchach – Hanchach was getting better anyway,’ replied Bartholomew tartly. ‘However, he might relapse if he declines to take his lungwort and colt’s-foot. The phlegm will rebuild in his chest, and he will be back where he started.’

  ‘I heard Arderne donated some of his own urine for Hanchach’s remedy,’ said Robin. ‘He claims all his bodily fluids contain healing powers, so he hoards them up and charges high prices for their sale. Why did I not think of such a ruse? I could have been rich beyond my wildest dreams.’

  There was a short pause, during which Paxtone and Rougham regarded the surgeon with distaste, and Bartholomew thought he might be sick.

  ‘The fact that we are prepared to join forces with Robin should tell you how seriously we take the threat of Arderne,’ said Paxtone to Bartholomew.

  ‘Here!’ said Robin, offended. ‘This alliance was my idea.’

  ‘True,’ said Rougham. ‘And we were none too keen when you first mooted it, but we see now that we have no choice. This is no place to talk, though. Come to the Angel, and I shall buy us all something to eat.’

  ‘The Angel?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘I do not think we should go there.’

  ‘Michael does not mind us purchasing food, just as long as we do not drink,’ argued Rougham. ‘Besides, you can always tell him you were investigating Ocleye’s death. I can tell you something that will lend credence to the lie, if you like. It is not much, though, just a snippet.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The day before he died, I saw Ocleye in conversation with a man who wore a hood to conceal his face. Ocleye was eating a pie, but his companion did not touch his, so something had robbed the fellow of his appetite. Ocleye was a spy, so he was obviously conducting some shady business.’

  ‘He was a shady man,’ agreed Paxtone. ‘I also saw him meeting with an unusual array of people – Spaldynge from Clare, and Carton of Michaelhouse, to name but two.’

  ‘Carton is not shady,’ objected Bartholomew.

  ‘He is not someone I would want as a colleague, though. He is complex – like Lynton, a man of many layers.’ Paxtone turned to Rougham. ‘But Matthew is right – we should be wary of breaking University rules. We shall eat these victuals in St Bene’t’s Churchyard. A man cannot live without a decent pie, and I would not be the man I am today, were it not for the Angel.’

  Bartholomew looked him up and down, and considered telling him the Angel had a lot to answer for, but a sober voice at the back of his mind reminded him that these were friends, and he should not insult them because he was tipsy. He took a deep breath to clear his wits, and followed them through a series of back alleys to Bene’t Street. They stepped into the leafy churchyard, where Paxtone sank on to a lichen-glazed tombstone. He clutched his stomach, and seemed to be in pain.

  ‘Are you sure you should be eating?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘Perhaps we should take you home.’

  Paxtone shook his head. ‘This is more important – I will have no home if Arderne gets his way.’

  ‘Robin can fetch the pies while we wait here,’ said Rougham, handing the surgeon a coin. ‘Make sure you ask for the chicken, Robin, because Honynge told me the mutton ones contain dog.’

  ‘Get me two,’ ordered Paxtone. ‘I find eating helps me think, and we shall need our wits if we are to devise an effective strategy against this vile leech.’

  When Robin had gone, Bartholomew and Rougham joined Paxtone on the tomb. Fortunately, trees concealed them from the folk who walked along Bene’t Street, because Bartholomew was sure three physicians sitting in a row on someone’s grave would be considered very peculiar behaviour. He heard two scholars discussing the Convocation of Regents as they passed, and learned that Trinity Hall planned to support Michael, but Bene’t College would oppose him.

  ‘Michael has discovered that Lynton ran gambling sessions in his Dispensary,’ he said. He glanced at Paxtone, trying not to sound accusing. ‘And you were one of his guests.’

  ‘What?’ exploded Rougham. ‘I do not believe you!’

  Paxtone sighed mournfully. ‘I am afraid it is true. I enjoyed my Friday nights with Lynton – until he started t
o invite townsmen, at which point I withdrew my custom. So did a number of others.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Bartholomew, while Rougham sat with his mouth open.

  ‘Because I felt I could not rely on a townsman’s discretion as I might a fellow scholar’s – it was in my colleagues’ interests to keep quiet, but laymen have nothing to lose by blabbing. Besides, while I enjoyed the intellectual exercise – it was great fun predicting the relative speeds of these fictitious horses – the townsmen were noisy in their excitement, and they ruined the genteel atmosphere. Your brother-in-law was all right, but I disliked Candelby’s company.’

  ‘Candelby was noisy?’ asked Bartholomew.

  ‘When he won – which was often – he was a dreadful gloat. He was quick with his sums, so he acquired a small fortune, including several houses. The games have had unforeseen consequences, though, because it is these very same buildings that lie at the heart of the rent war.’

  ‘Here we are,’ said Robin, arriving with the pies. Rougham was still digesting the news that Lynton owned a gaming house as he bit into his, but the rich flavours soon pushed the matter from his mind. Bartholomew remained overloaded with the Dominicans’ cakes, and declined the greasy offering, so Paxtone had it when he had eaten his own two. Then he finished Robin’s as well.

  ‘It will force out the blockage that is causing me pain,’ he explained, when he became aware that all three of his colleagues were regarding him askance. ‘It worked the other day.’

  ‘Let us turn to the business at hand,’ said Rougham, brushing crumbs from his hands and declining to comment. ‘Robin’s practice is finished – Arderne has ensured he has not a single patient left. Paxtone is now accused of seducing Mayor Harleston’s wife—’

  ‘Did you?’ asked Robin with considerable interest.

  Paxtone was indignant. ‘Of course not! She is far too old for me.’

  ‘Townsfolk judge us by their own corrupt standards,’ said Rougham consolingly. ‘Meanwhile, Arderne has been telling my patients that my special digestive tonics do not work. Then he set Isnard against Bartholomew, and now he has initiated that horrible rumour concerning Lynton.’