Tynkell regarded the student uneasily. ‘The life inside me?’
‘You know,’ said Deynman earnestly.
Tynkell cleared his throat, then shot a glance at Bartholomew to indicate he would like some help. ‘Well enough under the circumstances,’ he replied carefully, when the physician did nothing to oblige.
‘Good,’ said Deynman brightly, giving Bartholomew a hard nudge, to ensure his teacher had noticed that the Chancellor did not deny the charge. ‘Do feel free to call on Doctor Bartholomew, should you require a physic for your condition. Or on me, of course.’
‘Right,’ said Tynkell, becoming flustered and busying himself with his parchments.
‘I know these things can be awkward for men … for people like you,’ said Deynman, pressing his point relentlessly. ‘But I can be very discreet, and I am shocked by very little these days.’
‘I am glad to hear it,’ replied Tynkell. He swallowed hard, uncomfortable with an interview loaded with double meanings he did not understand. ‘Have you come to see the Hand?’
‘I shall say a prayer for you,’ said Deynman generously. ‘People in your condition need them.’
Bartholomew bundled his student up the stairs with Redmeadow giggling uncontrollably behind him, but then wondered whether he should have let the conversation run its course. If Deynman was sent down for claiming the Chancellor was the wrong sex, then it would solve one problem. Hopefully, Deynman’s father would not allow him to practise medicine if he ended his academic career in disgrace, and hundreds of prospective patients would be spared. Bartholomew wished he had not been so hasty to defend Tynkell’s sensibilities.
William was just ushering Bernarde the miller out, when Bartholomew, the students and Michael arrived at the University Chest on the floor above the Chancellor. Bernarde enquired after the investigation into the mill deaths, but did not seem surprised when the monk informed him there was nothing new to report.
‘There are folk downstairs who have been waiting for hours,’ said William, when Bernarde had gone. ‘It would not be fair to allow my own colleagues to petition the Hand before them. Take your place in the queue.’
‘Bernarde has not been waiting for hours,’ Michael pointed out. ‘I saw him not many moments ago, hurrying along the High Street and shoving coins at Mad Bess when she tried to waylay him.’
‘He is different,’ replied William, unperturbed that he had been caught out in an inconsistency. ‘He made a substantial donation for the privilege – something I am sure you do not intend to do.’
‘How much do you usually charge?’ asked Bartholomew curiously, thinking that Yolande would be unlikely to afford the sort of payment Bernarde – or Isobel, Cheney or even Orwelle – might make.
William raised his shoulders. ‘It depends on the individual. They give what they can – or what their consciences dictate they should. Some folk pay nothing at all, because they are too poor, while others pay in gold. It is between them and God.’
‘And you,’ said Bartholomew, indicating a box on the windowsill that was full to overflowing.
‘I am merely the collector,’ said William loftily. ‘And do not look so disapproving, Matthew. Some of this will be used to pay you, when you are next required as Corpse Examiner. The University is doing rather nicely from the revenues raised by the Hand.’
‘How nicely?’ asked Michael suspiciously.
William looked smug. ‘Well, just yesterday I had three pennies from Rougham, a groat from Lavenham the apothecary, and a skin of wine from Warde of Valence Marie. And you enjoyed some of that wine yourself last night, Brother, so do not tell me I should not have accepted it.’
‘But you should not,’ exclaimed Michael. ‘God’s teeth, man! Do you not see how dangerous this might become? You cannot accept bribes and bring them to Michaelhouse. This must stop!’
‘But I have secured six pounds over the last few weeks!’ cried William, horrified that his foray into commerce might be about to meet an abrupt end. ‘And every penny has gone into the University Chest – I keep a record, if you want to see it. And what shall I say to the folk who come? That the University has decided no one is allowed access? Do you not see that would be equally dangerous?’
‘He has a point,’ said Bartholomew to Michael. ‘Now this has started, it may be difficult to stop.’
‘Damn it, William,’ muttered Michael. ‘You have unleashed a monster.’
‘It was a monster you should have destroyed a long time ago,’ said Bartholomew, thinking the monk should bear some responsibility for the situation. It had been his decision to keep the Hand, and he had promoted William to Keeper of the University Chest, knowing the Hand was in it. It did not take a genius to predict what William was sure to do with it.
‘You would not believe the things I have heard folk tell the Hand,’ said William, hoping to convince Michael that the relic had its uses. ‘Deschalers came, before he died. He was one of the first merchants to visit.’
‘What did he say?’ asked Bartholomew, grateful that William had added the caveat ‘before he died’. He did not like to imagine the Hand petitioned by the dead, as well as the living.
‘He prayed for forgiveness,’ said William. ‘I am bound by the seal of confession, so cannot give you too many details. But he prayed for Bottisham, and he asked for a cure for his own ailment. He told the Hand it was his last hope, and said he hoped his plan would work.’
‘I am glad you did not reveal too many details,’ muttered Bartholomew; William had been rather free with what had, after all, been a genuine confession and should have been kept confidential.
‘Did he pray for Bottisham in the kind of way that indicated his victim would soon die?’ asked Michael keenly, constrained by no such moral dilemmas. ‘And exactly what was this plan?’
‘He prayed for lots of people, but for Bottisham in particular. I do not recall him saying he planned murder obviously, or I would have stopped him. But he did not say he was not.’ William pursed his lips, as though Deschalers not mentioning a crime was as damning as an admission.
‘And the plan?’ asked Michael.
The friar shrugged. ‘I am sorry, Brother. I did not hear that bit. He spoke too softly.’
‘Let us see this Hand, William,’ said Michael wearily. ‘And then we will leave you in peace.’
‘It is in its reliquary,’ said William, indicating a hand some box that stood on the table in the centre of the room. It was a beautiful thing, covered in precious stones and delicately carved.
‘That box contains a piece of the True Cross,’ cried Michael, shocked. ‘Have you shoved Peterkin Starre’s severed limb on top of what is a genuine relic?’
‘The box was empty when I did an inventory of the University Chest’s contents,’ said William, unperturbed by Michael’s horror. ‘Since it has not been opened in years, I am inclined to believe that the True Cross was never there in the first place – or it was stolen so long ago that the thief is long since burning in Hell. It seemed a shame to have a glorious reliquary with no relic, so I put the Hand in it instead. I could show you the Hand, but I usually keep it locked away. It does not do to allow the peasantry to become too familiar with sacred objects. It might send them insane.’
‘I am not a peasant,’ said Michael indignantly. ‘Nor will I start baying at the moon because I set eyes on a few dead fingers.’
William cast him the kind of glance that indicated he was not so sure, but bent over the box and, with great reverence, removed a satin parcel that held the yellow-white bones. They were exactly as Bartholomew remembered, with sinews cleverly left to hold the hand together – except for one place where they had broken and were mended with a cunningly concealed pin. The bones were huge, and belonged, without question, to the simpleton whose gigantic corpse had provided a convenient source of material for men who had thought Cambridge needed a relic of its own. The little blue-green ring it wore was still there, too – a cheap thing, but pretty enough.
&nb
sp; ‘There!’ breathed Michael. ‘The bones that caused us so much trouble when wicked men used them for their own vile and selfish purposes. They look just as they did two years ago, when they brought about so much unhappiness and tragedy.’
‘They are causing us problems now, too,’ said Bartholomew, somewhat accusingly. ‘The University should not be taking money from folk to visit them. It is not right.’
‘If you stop now, you will learn the true meaning of trouble,’ warned William. ‘People like the Hand. They believe it has the power to answer their prayers, and will not take kindly to you saying they can no longer use it. They would storm the church and snatch it away.’
‘You are probably right,’ said Michael. ‘We shall have to devise another way to put an end to this madness. But I have seen enough. It is almost time for our evening meal.’
‘If you are hungry, then do not go to Michaelhouse,’ advised Redmeadow. ‘We are so short of funds that Agatha is serving stale bread and pea pottage tonight. We are going to visit Deynman’s brother at Maud’s Hostel, where there will be roasted goose.’
‘And I am dining at the Franciscan Friary,’ said William. ‘A man who has been working hard all day deserves more than mouldy bread and green paste. I intend to partake of fish soup and turnips.’
‘I want meat,’ said Michael, who did not feel he had eaten unless half a sheep was involved. He glanced down at the table. ‘But nothing with bones in it.’
‘I shall say a prayer for Chancellor Tynkell, and then I shall be finished here,’ said Deynman, kneeling down. He looked up at William. ‘He is a herbivore, you know.’
William’s eyebrows went up, and he looked thoughtful. ‘Perhaps that explains his peculiar aroma. A man who eats grass must surely smell differently from the rest of us.’
It was Deynman’s turn to look bemused, but he put his hands together, closed his eyes and the conversation was mercifully at an end. William began to lock the Hand away while the two students prayed, and Bartholomew and Michael took the opportunity to leave.
‘Lord!’ said Michael, beginning to laugh as they walked into the evening sunlight. ‘Deynman is a kindly boy, but he has the sense of a gnat! Tynkell is a herbivore indeed! Is that why he was asking after his health earlier? He believes the Chancellor has the digestive system of a cow?’
‘He thinks Tynkell is a hermaphrodite, but could not remember the correct word. I will spare you the contorted logic he went through to reach this momentous conclusion.’
‘His logic may be contorted,’ said Michael, his laughter dissipating. ‘But his conclusions are not. Tynkell is indeed a hermaphrodite, although I would rather keep this between ourselves. I do not want men like William claiming that a woman cannot hold the post of Chancellor. Tynkell is malleable, and does what I ask. I do not want him expelled, just because of an accident of birth.’
Bartholomew gaped at him. ‘I do not believe you.’
‘Have you not noticed that he never removes his clothes?’ asked Michael. ‘Or wondered why he refuses to let anyone see his body? Even you have not seen it, and you were his physician. Also, you must be aware that he does not bathe. That is because he cannot risk anyone intruding and viewing what he has sought to hide all these years.’
‘No!’ said Bartholomew in disbelief. ‘You cannot be right!’
Michael shrugged. ‘It is your prerogative to be sceptical. But look more closely at his shape when you next have the opportunity. You will notice swellings in the chest. And in the latrines—’
‘But the condition is so rare,’ interrupted Bartholomew, trying to recall what he had learned about a physiology he never thought he would see. ‘I read about it, but I have never seen it manifest itself.’
‘I imagine folk so afflicted do not make themselves available for general viewing. Most hide it, as Tynkell has done. It is safer, considering we live in a world populated by the intolerant and fanatical.’
‘So Deynman’s diagnosis was right?’ Bartholomew narrowed his eyes. ‘You are jesting with me!’
‘Yes,’ said Michael, convulsing with laughter.
‘We are left with a mystery, Matt,’ said Michael the next morning, as he and Bartholomew walked to St Michael’s Church. Father William, ahead of them in the line of scholars that filed along the lane, turned to mutter about them setting a poor example to students by talking in the procession.
It was a pretty day, with a pale blue sky flecked by wispy clouds. The scent of spring was in the air, and bluebells and tiny white violets lined the grassy banks along the edge of the alley. Scruffy children were already gathering them to sell in the streets and at church doors. If they were lucky, they might earn enough to exchange for bread or an onion.
Despite the early hour, the town was busy. Traders gathered in the Market Square to sell their wares, and beggars were out in force, displaying sores and wounds, and raising piteous voices in an appeal for spare coins. Many gathered around the High Street churches, hoping to catch scholars in a pious frame of mind as they left their morning prayers.
‘We still have no idea whether Deschalers killed Bottisham, then committed suicide, or the other way around,’ Michael went on. ‘Nor do we know why. We have established that Deschalers and Bottisham knew each other, and that they had quarrelled in the past. Warde told you Bottisham’s antagonism had long since evaporated, but who knows whether that was really true? And, regarding the ancient dispute about the field, it is difficult to decide which of the two men was in the right.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Bartholomew, surprised. ‘Deschalers should not have been angry with Bottisham because he declined to break the law. I would say Bottisham was in the right.’
‘And I would say Deschalers was. If Bottisham was squeamish about what needed to be done for his client, then he should not have agreed to represent him in the first place. But it does not matter what we think. What is important is what they thought. By all reports Deschalers was barely civil to Bottisham, so what led them to meet each other in such a curious place the night they died?’
‘They must have agreed to go there,’ said Bartholomew. ‘The King’s Mill is not somewhere you would happen upon by accident.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Michael, ignoring William’s black scowl.
‘I might have suggested that Deschalers visited the mill to inspect the property he had invested in, and Bottisham spotted lights in a building usually locked at that time of night and went to investigate. But that is not possible: no one passes the mill by chance, because it is on a path that leads nowhere.’
‘True. Then what about the possibility that one caught the other committing suicide, and ended up dead when he tried to stop him?’ Michael shook his head and answered his own question. ‘No. Neither was the kind to kill himself.’
‘We know Deschalers intended to go to the mill, because he had the key with him,’ mused Bartholomew. ‘But why he was there is not really the question we need answered: we need to know why Bottisham was there with him.’
‘We must come up with a solution soon, or people are going to start accusing the University of covering up a murder. It is one thing when someone lowly is killed by a scholar, but there will be a furious outcry about Bottisham killing a rich man like Deschalers.’
‘It may have happened the other way around. In fact, if I were to wager on the outcome, that would be my choice: Deschalers was ruthless and inclined to be vicious, whereas Bottisham was more likely to wound with his tongue.’
‘We will never prove either theory with the information we have now. I think—’
‘If you must persist with this unseemly chattering, then leave the procession,’ boomed William, finally driven to anger. Several students smirked at the sound of discord among the Fellows. ‘I know you have murders to solve, but there is a time and a place for everything, and your investigations do not belong here.’
‘He is jealous,’ whispered Michael to Bartholomew, as William moved on. ‘Now he is no longer
my Junior Proctor, he feels left out when I am on a case.’
‘Who will replace him? Do you have someone in mind?’
‘I do not want a replacement.’
Bartholomew looked at him sharply. ‘You did not use the Junior Proctor’s honorarium to pay for a Corpse Examiner, did you? I am effectively your subordinate, but with a different title?’
‘Well, why not?’ asked Michael, not bothering to deny that he had manipulated the situation. ‘I know where I am with you. And better the devil …’
‘And you certainly should not discuss the Devil while you process to mass!’ screeched William. ‘I am Keeper of the University Chest, and I will not stand by and see College rules shamelessly flaunted by Fellows who should know better.’
‘And I am Senior Proctor, and outrank you,’ snapped Michael.
‘I am an important man,’ argued William, although his voice dropped to a more reasonable level. He knew Michael was right. ‘Particularly now the Hand of Valence Marie is in my care.’
Michael regarded him with cool, green eyes. ‘And you must see how badly that will end. You have drawn attention to the fact that the University holds a relic that was discovered in the town’s ditches. Note I say town’s ditches, Father. It is only a matter of time before the burgesses claim we have taken something that is rightfully theirs.’
‘I am doing what I think is ethical,’ declared William hotly. ‘The Chest is in my care, and I shall decide how to deal with its contents. I will not have you telling me what I can and cannot do.’
Michael continued to glare. ‘Actually, you have no choice. I created the post of Keeper, and I can just as easily dispense with it. If you want to stay in power, then you will do as I say. You must devise a way to stop people coming to view the Hand without it resulting in ill feelings – or worse.’
‘But I—’ objected William.
Bartholomew 10 - The Hand of Justice Page 23
