A Deadly Brew

by Susanna GREGORY

  ‘For me too,’ said Bartholomew, his eyes straying to the peaty water in the cup.

  ‘By the time I judged it safe to stop running, I was hopelessly lost,’ said Michael, taking up the story. ‘I took the saddle off the poor horse and discovered that someone had put burrs under it. Yours was probably the same, which accounts for their unruly behaviour. It was probably a ploy intended to exhaust us so that we would be less able to fight them when the time came. Anyway, I wandered aimlessly for the rest of the day until Cynric found me just before dusk. He brought us to the causeway and I suggested we claim sanctuary here at Denny. I knew the nuns would not refuse a monk in distress, even though they are usually wary of accepting unknown men inside their walls.’

  ‘At first light yesterday, I set off to look for Egil,’ continued Cynric. ‘I have no idea what happened to him. I was searching for clues when I found you.’

  ‘You were lucky, Matt,’ said Michael, stating the obvious. ‘You would not have survived much longer out there.’ He shuddered and drew the blankets up under his chin. ‘The Fens are a foul place to be in the winter. It is the one thing about my abbey at Ely that I do not miss.’

  ‘I wondered why Alan was so averse to having Cynric, Egil and Jurnet accompany us,’ said Bartholomew. ‘He knew it would be more difficult to murder five people than the two he had originally envisaged.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Michael thoughtfully. ‘Yet even so, I would have expected experienced mercenaries to have put up a better show. It was seven against five. I was unarmed, you are useless in armed combat, yet they allowed three to escape.’

  ‘Two – they thought they saw him drown,’ said Cynric, indicating Bartholomew. ‘And I am sure they believed you and I would go the same way, lost and alone in the marshes.’

  ‘That is beside the point,’ said Michael. ‘The soldiers Oswald Stanmore employs to guard his cloth carts would not have been so incompetent.’

  Cynric mused for a moment and then nodded slowly. ‘You are right – they were poor fighters. Perhaps they were not soldiers at all.’

  ‘I wonder if they were the outlaws the Sheriff has been chasing this winter,’ suggested Michael. ‘They could be, you know. He told me they use the Fens like a stronghold, disappearing down little-known pathways when his men close in on them. And Alan did seem to know his way around when he took that short cut.’

  ‘Perhaps they are, but what do we do now?’ asked Bartholomew, standing and beginning to pace as he did when he was restless.

  Michael watched him. ‘Nothing. It is late, and while you may have slept all day, we did not. I have been hearing the nuns’ confessions – and that was an eye-opener I can tell you; I should come here more often! – and Cynric has been searching for Egil. Go to sleep, Matt. We will talk again in the morning.’

  He heaved his bulk onto its side and huddled down under the blankets as the wind rattled the shutters. Cynric did likewise, while Bartholomew lay back on his bed and stared up at the ceiling. He wondered what had happened to Egil, and dreaded telling Stanmore that his two men had been lost. Edith said that Egil was a Fenman. If by some remote chance he had not been killed by the mercenaries, he was one of the few people who might escape the treacherous marshes alive. There was thus a glimmer of hope, although Bartholomew suspected it was not a realistic one.

  He listened to the patter of rain against the windows, watched the firelight flickering on the walls and felt a chill settle in his stomach. Stanmore’s men were murdered, Grene and Armel were dead from poisoned wine, Isaac was hanged and someone had been to some trouble to ensure he, Michael and Cynric died in the marshes. What vile plot was being hatched this time?

  By the following day, the rain had abated and there were patches of blue sky among the grey clouds. Bartholomew rose at dawn, woken by the sound of the nuns’ chanting in the church. Michael opened a bleary eye, but grunted irritably and pulled the blankets up over his head to try to block out the noise. Bartholomew washed and shaved near the hearth, relishing the luxury of hot water and a warm room, and dressed in the clothes that Cynric had cleaned the day before. They were bone dry and crisp from being near the fire, something he had never experienced in Michaelhouse, even in the summer. He inspected the tear in his leggings, surprised, and not entirely pleased, to see that someone had repaired it using a patch of brilliant red.

  ‘I did that,’ said Cynric, not without pride. ‘One of those nuns wanted to do it, but I did not like to think of your clothes in their hands.’ He gave Bartholomew a meaningful look that the physician did not understand at all.

  ‘Why not?’ he asked, convinced that the nuns would have done a better job than Cynric, and most certainly would not have used a scarlet patch to mend the brown garment.

  Cynric pursed his lips and would be drawn no further. Michael was listening from his bed and gave a sudden roar of laughter.

  ‘You are right to be cautious, Cynric my friend,’ he said, green eyes glittering with amusement. ‘And if you had heard their confessions, Matt, you would understand why!’

  ‘Michael, this is a convent,’ said Bartholomew, suspecting that the monk was simply trying to unnerve his prudish book-bearer. ‘What could nuns possibly do to pique your lecherous interests out here in the Fens?’

  Michael laughed again, but whatever reply he had been about to make was forgotten at a knock on the door. He hauled the blankets around his chin primly, as Bartholomew admitted a lay sister who carried a tray bearing barley bread, some slivers of cheese and a jug of ale, and told them the Abbess wished to see them later that morning. When she had gone, Michael hauled himself reluctantly from his bed, and donned his habit, nodding approvingly at Cynric’s efforts to remove the black, clinging mud from it.

  Bartholomew fretted while they waited for the Abbess’s summons. ‘I need to return to Michaelhouse,’ he said, pacing in front of the window. ‘We have wasted two days already with this miserable business, and I am worried about Gray’s disputation. We should go home.’

  ‘What do you plan to do?’ Cynric asked of Michael. Bartholomew’s steps faltered: it had not occurred to him that Michael would want to do anything other than return to College.

  Michael mused. ‘I am undecided. It is tempting to continue to enjoy the Abbess’s hospitality, and a few days would give us the opportunity to think and to recover from our ordeal. But I would like to speak to the Bishop, and so am inclined to travel to Ely. Yet I also believe that the answer to this riddle we seem to have stumbled upon lies in Cambridge, and the sooner we return, the quicker we will have it resolved.’

  ‘I see no reason to go to Ely,’ objected Bartholomew nervously. ‘We know the Bishop’s summons was false.’ He hesitated. ‘At least, I suppose we can assume it was.’

  Michael’s eyes narrowed. ‘What are you suggesting?’

  Bartholomew regarded him sombrely. ‘Perhaps the Bishop really did summon you on Sunday – for reasons of his own.’

  Michael met his gaze with unreadable eyes. ‘You suspect it has something to do with my rejecting the offer to be Master of Valence Marie?’ he asked eventually. He did not wait for an answer. ‘Believe me, Matt, the Bishop has his own perfectly good reasons for wishing me to refuse the Mastership. He would hardly encourage me to decline, and then arrange my demise. The reason he persuaded me to not to accept in the first place was so that I would be free to continue to act as his agent.’

  Bartholomew supposed he was right, although sometimes the convoluted logic of the power-brokers in University, town and Church eluded him completely.

  ‘So who do you think is responsible for luring us out here?’ he asked.

  Michael sat on his bed and stretched his long legs out in front of him, ankles incongruously white next to his black habit. ‘It is someone with resources. It would not be cheap to hire six soldiers and Alan. Mercenaries are likely to demand a high price for premeditated murder.’

  ‘Who has such resources?’ demanded Bartholomew. ‘Other than the Bishop?’


  ‘Alan and his men were not mercenaries,’ Cynric pointed out. ‘We decided last night that they were too incompetent to be real soldiers.’

  Michael ignored both of them. ‘The Chancellor could probably lay his hands on sufficient funds, and doubtless has the contacts to organise such an incident. But he has no motive and he is not even in Cambridge.’

  ‘De Wetherset lives near here,’ said Bartholomew suddenly, thinking of the previous holder of the Chancellorship, who had retired into the Fens when University politics became too much for him.

  ‘No, Matt,’ said Michael firmly. ‘By all accounts, de Wetherset is enjoying his seclusion and has no wish to re-enter University affairs.’

  ‘But he has never liked us,’ persisted Bartholomew. ‘He used us to do his dirty work, but he never really trusted us and he lied constantly.’

  ‘Who in the University does not lie?’ asked Michael glibly. ‘But you are on the wrong track altogether. De Wetherset has nothing to do with the University these days, and he certainly does not have the resources to hire Alan and his cronies. We need to look to Cambridge for our answer. Besides the Chancellor, there are a host of townspeople who could afford to have people killed – your brother-in-law to name but one.’

  ‘That is ridiculous!’ protested Bartholomew. ‘Oswald is not a murderer! And he has no reason to wish harm on us.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Michael. ‘But there is the mystery involving his apprentice and this bottle of wine. Father Philius has no reason to tell us untruths.’

  ‘And neither does Oswald!’ insisted Bartholomew. ‘There must be some misunderstanding. I will see Philius when we get back, and we will probably find out that it was Cheney’s apprentice he saw, or Deschalers’s or Mortimer’s. All four live next to each other on Milne Street and he may have mistaken one house for another.’

  Michael regarded him sceptically. ‘Philius is not stupid, Matt, regardless of what you might think about his medical abilities. And, anyway, your students said they saw Oswald’s apprentice buy poisoned wine from Sacks in the Brazen George. Or were they mistaken, too?’

  Bartholomew was racking his brain for an answer when the lay sister returned and said the Abbess awaited them in her solar. Still unsettled by Michael’s accusations, Bartholomew followed her down the stairs, Michael and Cynric in tow. Bartholomew glanced behind him, and saw Michael patting his hair into place and making haste to brush a few crumples out of his habit. When the monk rubbed surreptitiously at his teeth with a corner of his sleeve, Bartholomew’s suspicions were aroused regarding Michael’s motives for tarrying at the convent.

  There was only one entrance to the guesthall and that was through a small door to one side of the main gate. In this way, visitors were kept entirely apart from the nuns; a person wishing to enter the convent from the guesthall was forced to do so through the main gate like everyone else: men staying there could not inadvertently stray into the nuns’ living quarters, while the nuns themselves would see no one for whom they might be tempted to break their vows. It was doubtless only Michael’s vocation as a monk that prompted the Abbess to relax the rules and allow three men inside her hallowed walls.

  As they walked across the cobbled yard towards the Abbess’s quarters, Bartholomew was aware of being watched with intense interest. He glanced upwards and saw several veiled heads eyeing him with undisguised curiosity from the unglazed windows of the dormitory, while others looked from the cloister that surrounded the yard. Voices whispered and giggled and, from the lewdness of the laughter, Bartholomew strongly suspected that the nuns were not discussing matters spiritual. He began to feel uncomfortable, although Michael did not appear to mind greatly. Cynric muttered that he would wait in the guesthall, and, before Bartholomew could stop him, he had scuttled back across the yard and was out through the main gate. Hoots of laughter followed him and Bartholomew was tempted to follow, unsettled by the nuns’ behaviour.

  Finally, they were across the yard and were being led up the wide wooden staircase that led to the Abbess’s solar. The Countess of Pembroke’s money had provided the residents of Denny with sumptuous surroundings, despite the fact that Franciscan nuns were commonly called ‘Poor Clares’. Thick woollen rugs covered the floor and the walls were painted with vivid murals depicting scenes from classical mythology and local folklore. By comparison, the decorations in Constantine Mortimer’s elegant house appeared crass and tasteless. The rugs had been chosen to complement the dominant hues of the wall paintings, while even the bowls on the low table near the fire had been carefully selected to match the solar’s colour scheme.

  The Abbess was waiting for them, her hands hidden demurely in the wide sleeves of her gown, and was flanked by two of her nuns. Bartholomew had last seen her at the high table next to Vice-Chancellor Harling at the installation at Valence Marie, and knew her reputation for learning and saintliness. She was tall for a woman, and her movements had a fluid elegance born of a grace that was innate. Her eyes were an arresting turquoise, accentuated by the plain grey of her habit, and her face was not yet blemished with the wrinkles of middle age.

  The nuns at her side were chalk and cheese. One was an elderly lady whose hooked nose swooped down towards her prominent chin and whose skin was as wrinkled and brown as an old nut; the second was apparently a relative of the Abbess, for her eyes were a similar, although less vivid, blue-green colour.

  The Abbess stepped forward, and Michael elbowed Bartholomew out of the way to take her hand and effect an elegant bow.

  ‘Brother Michael!’ said the Abbess courteously. ‘I am pleased to see you well again. And your companion.’ She looked at Bartholomew, who hastened to follow Michael’s example and bow.

  ‘My Lady Abbess, may I present to you my friend and colleague Doctor Bartholomew,’ said Michael, holding her hand for rather longer than was necessary. She looked uncomfortable and tried to free it, but Michael appeared not to notice and did not slacken his grip. ‘He is also a Fellow of Michaelhouse. We would like to thank you for your gracious hospitality.’

  The Abbess finally succeeded in retrieving her hand and inclined her head politely. She indicated the nuns who stood at her side. ‘May I introduce Dame Pelagia, my cellarer, and my niece Julianna.’ The nuns curtseyed demurely, although Bartholomew was discomfited by Julianna’s somewhat brazen stare. This did not seem to bother Michael, who met her eyes boldly as he took her hand and bowed almost as deeply as he had done to the Abbess.

  ‘Are you quite recovered from your ordeal?’ enquired the Abbess, indicating that they should sit in the chairs that were arranged around the fireside, and selecting the one that was farthest from Michael for herself.

  ‘Almost,’ said Michael, before Bartholomew could reply, ‘although you will notice that my colleague still limps from the near-fatal wound in his leg.’

  The three nuns made sympathetic faces and Bartholomew shot Michael a look of embarrassment. By no stretch of the imagination could a graze be called ‘near-fatal’ and Bartholomew was certain he had not limped.

  ‘Then you should remain here until you are fully well,’ said the Abbess while, next to her, Julianna gave Bartholomew a smile that verged on being a leer.

  ‘We have imposed on your generosity quite long enough,’ he said firmly, before Michael could agree to a lengthy sojourn. ‘We will leave today and trouble you no further.’

  ‘But you are no trouble at all,’ said Julianna, smiling coquettishly at Bartholomew from under her thick eyelashes. ‘We would be honoured if you would stay longer.’ Her eyes travelled down his body to the patch on his leggings. ‘And perhaps there are little services we might perform for you.’

  Bartholomew was unable to look at Michael, whose eyebrows shot up into his hair. Instead he gazed at Julianna, uncertain how to respond to her ambiguous suggestion.

  ‘Your servant clearly cannot count the mending of garments among his undoubted talents,’ said the Abbess, indicating the scarlet patch and smiling sweetly to relieve Bartholomew’s
discomfiture.

  ‘He cannot, but I can,’ interposed Julianna eagerly. ‘And if you agree to stay longer, I will re-mend that hole for you. I could do it now, as we talk.’

  ‘No!’ said Bartholomew, more vehemently than he intended, but determined not to be divested in the Abbess’s private apartments. ‘It is perfectly functional as it is.’

  ‘And our Abbess is a far neater needlewoman than you anyway, Julianna,’ said Dame Pelagia, in the blunt manner of old ladies. ‘If the doctor’s leggings require attention, then she should do the honours if he is to receive the best the Abbey can offer.’

  ‘All this is quite unnecessary,’ said Michael impatiently. ‘The leggings look perfectly good as they are. After all, us monastics should not be encouraging vanity among the laity.’ He folded his hands in his sleeves and assumed a saintly expression. Bartholomew eyed him in disbelief, recalling the amount of primping that had taken place as the monk had prepared himself for the installation ceremony.

  ‘But regardless of whether the leggings should be mended properly, you must both stay until you are fully recovered,’ said Julianna firmly, ‘however long that might take.’

  ‘Well …’ said Michael.

  ‘You would be most welcome,’ said the Abbess sincerely. ‘And with all these outlaws prowling the roads, it will be good for us to have the security of three men within our walls.’

  ‘But we are not fighters,’ said Bartholomew, alarmed. ‘I do not even have a weapon!’

  ‘That can be arranged,’ said Julianna comfortably. ‘I have a dagger you can borrow.’

  Bartholomew regarded her with dismay. What kind of nun offered to lend people her dagger? He looked at the Abbess, who seemed as startled by Julianna’s offer as Bartholomew had been. Dame Pelagia merely sat back in her chair and raised her eyes heavenward, although a smile of amusement played about the corners of her lips.