The Habit of Murder: The Twenty Third Chronicle of Matthew Bartholomew (Chronicles of Matthew Bartholomew Book 23)

by Susanna Gregory

  ‘The murder of her steward’s wife is not the same as some faceless neighbour. If Bonde is the culprit, she will have no choice but to act.’

  In Bartholomew’s experience, the rich and powerful had a rather flexible attitude regarding what constituted the right thing to do, so he was rather less sanguine about justice being done. He turned back to Quintone.

  ‘I do not suppose Bonde mentioned letting anyone – other than Roos – into the castle last night, did he?’

  ‘He would not have let Roos in,’ averred Quintone. ‘Roos was a stranger, and Bonde is particular about things like that.’

  ‘But he did let Roos in,’ Bartholomew pointed out. ‘The body in the cistern proves it.’

  Quintone shrugged. ‘Then Roos grew wings and flew over the walls, because he could not have got past the Lady’s favourite henchman. You met Bonde – the man is an animal.’

  Next, Michael decided to speak to Marishal. However, when they reached the hearth, the steward had gone. There was no sign of the twins either. Lichet saw their bemusement and came to explain.

  ‘I sent them to bed with a potion to ease their minds. They are grieving, you see.’

  ‘So are we,’ said Michael coolly. ‘Roos was our colleague, do not forget.’

  ‘Yes, but he is not nearly as important as Margery,’ said Lichet dismissively. ‘She was the steward’s wife, whereas he was just a scholar.’

  Michael regarded him coldly. ‘Roos’s murder is just as grave a crime as hers, and will be treated as such. Now, take us to Marishal at once.’

  ‘I shall not! You may apply to me tomorrow, when I shall decide whether he is equal to an audience. Until then, he and his family are off limits. And do not think you can circumvent me – I put guards on the door to their quarters with orders to skewer anyone trying to sneak past.’

  ‘What kind of potion did you feed the Marishals?’ asked Bartholomew, while Michael gave the Red Devil the kind of look that suggested he had just replaced Bonde as prime suspect.

  ‘One that brings healing sleep,’ replied Lichet shortly. ‘All three will be dead to the world by now, so even if you do manage to slink past my security arrangements, they will not be in a position to answer questions. Ergo, I advise you not to bother.’

  ‘Where is the Lady?’ demanded Michael, deciding to see what she had to say about such high-handed tactics, while Bartholomew mused that drugging the steward was one way for Lichet to ensure he was not deprived of his new-found power. However, while it might be acceptable to dose a grieving family with a mild soporific, it was definitely not good practice to give them one that rendered them ‘dead to the world’. Again, he wondered if Lichet was deliberately sabotaging Michael’s enquiry.

  ‘She was also distraught, so I gave her a draught as well,’ Lichet informed Michael loftily. ‘They will all feel better in the morning.’

  ‘What was in it?’ pressed Bartholomew. ‘Exactly.’

  ‘It is a secret recipe, although I can tell you that it includes hemlock and honey. It is not one you will find in any of your medical tomes, though, so do not waste your time trying to look it up.’

  ‘You used hemlock to promote natural sleep?’ Bartholomew was horrified. ‘Is that not akin to using a mallet for cracking nuts?’

  ‘It is perfectly safe for those of us who know what we are doing,’ retorted Lichet. ‘It is only the inexperienced or stupid who make mistakes in dosage.’

  Manfully, Bartholomew ignored the insult. ‘Did you ever feed any of this “secret recipe” to Wisbech or Skynere?’

  ‘No, because Skynere was Grym’s patient, while Wisbech took his medical problems to the priory.’ Lichet gave a superior smile. ‘I do not believe those two were poisoned anyway. There is no evidence to say they were – just a lot of unfounded speculation by an uneducated barber.’

  ‘What about the other deaths?’ asked Michael, before Bartholomew could indulge in a piece-by-piece demolition of Lichet’s own medical skills. It was unnecessary, as they had already surmised that he was a charlatan with no university training. ‘Roger, Charer and Talmach. Do you have an opinion about what happened to them?’

  ‘Of course – they were accidents, and anyone who claims otherwise is just trying to encourage trouble between us and the town. Roger was killed by a falling plank, Charer fell in the river, and Talmach tumbled off his horse. There was nothing suspicious about any of them.’

  ‘I see,’ said Bartholomew flatly. ‘Where were you between nocturns and dawn?’

  ‘Me?’ asked Lichet warily. ‘Why do you want to know?’

  ‘Because you live above the cistern,’ explained Michael, before Bartholomew could say something more accusatory – there was no point in alerting the Red Devil to the fact that he was high on their list of suspects. ‘You may have seen or heard something.’

  ‘And I probably would, had I been there,’ replied Lichet haughtily. ‘Because I am an extremely observant man, and very little escapes my attention. But I was in the palace all night, watching the Lady sleep.’

  ‘Why would you do that?’ asked Bartholomew, suspicious all over again.

  Lichet smiled superiorly. ‘Because I have taken it upon myself to ensure that she has eight hours of undisturbed rest every night. I was with her until daybreak.’

  ‘No, you were not,’ countered Bartholomew, disliking the fact that Lichet considered them fools who would swallow his lies without question. ‘You were one of the first on the scene when the bodies were found. You “appeared from nowhere” according to one witness.’

  ‘Well, obviously a man must slip to the latrine on occasion,’ shrugged Lichet, so smoothly that Bartholomew suspected he had been preparing his defence ever since the bodies had been found. ‘I took care of business, and was on my way back when Adam raised the alarm. Naturally, I went to see if I could help.’

  ‘Who else was there?’ demanded Bartholomew, with the sole intention of catching him out.

  Unfortunately, Lichet was too clever to make such a basic mistake, and his reply was flawless, even down to the detail of Marishal covering Margery with his own cloak.

  ‘So your alibi for the time of the murder is the Lady,’ said Bartholomew, unwilling to let him off the hook, ‘who was fast asleep at the time, so cannot verify it.’

  Lichet smiled serenely. ‘Who knows? Perhaps she will remember the guardian angel at the foot of her bed, but perhaps she will not. You may ask her tomorrow, when she wakes, although phrase your question with care. She will not appreciate insinuations made against esteemed members of her household, and may respond by excising you from her will.’

  ‘He is our culprit,’ determined Bartholomew, once Lichet had strutted away. ‘He cannot prove where he was at the salient time, and he wants us to believe that the other suspicious deaths were accidents. He would probably have insisted that Roos and Margery died of natural causes as well, if no one else had been in a position to examine the bodies.’

  ‘Possibly,’ acknowledged Michael. ‘But he is right about one thing – the Lady will resent her favourites coming under suspicion, so we must proceed with care.’

  ‘It will take a powerful dose of medicine to make someone sleep until tomorrow,’ Bartholomew went on in disgust. ‘One that not even a dubious practitioner like Lichet would dare use on an old lady in indifferent health. Ergo, there will be an opportunity to question her today. Of course, we all know why he wants us to stay away from her.’

  ‘We do?’

  ‘So that when she wakes, he can convince her that he was watching over her all night.’

  ‘Or perhaps he knows that one of the Marishals is the killer,’ mused Michael, ‘and aims to use the time coaching them on how to evade justice.’

  ‘Why would he do that? He wants them out of the way, so he can run the castle instead.’

  ‘He can pose as Acting Steward temporarily, but the post is hereditary, so must revert to the family eventually,’ explained Michael. ‘However, the Lady will not want to l
ose Marishal, and Marishal will not want to lose his brats. Ergo, Lichet could earn their undying gratitude by making inconvenient accusations go away – gratitude that could be permanent and lucrative.’

  Bartholomew glanced at the dais. ‘Albon seems to have finished interrogating everyone now, although how he managed to work his way through upwards of two hundred people in so short a space of time is beyond me. Perhaps Langelee can explain.’

  As they walked towards the front of the hall, Albon stood and nodded to the guards, who opened the doors, allowing bright daylight to stream in and people to stream out. Langelee was shaking his head in stunned disbelief.

  ‘He pressed no one for details,’ he said. ‘Mostly, he just asked one question: did you stab Mistress Marishal? Not surprisingly, no one said yes, and then he was beckoning his next “witness” forward. He seems to think that no one will lie to a man of honour.’

  Michael laughed. ‘So what will he do now?’

  ‘Kneel in the chapel, next to Margery’s coffin, and reflect on all he has learned. I told him that would not take long, given that he has uncovered virtually nothing to ponder, but he said he expects to be there for the rest of the day.’

  ‘He is out of his depth and he knows it,’ surmised Michael. ‘So we shall corner him in a moment, and offer some friendly advice – and ask him a few questions into the bargain.’

  ‘Good,’ said Langelee, ‘because it is possible that he is going to the chapel in order to reflect on the crimes he committed – to devise a way to exonerate himself.’

  ‘We should speak to the hermit when we have finished with Albon,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Bonde mentioned him prowling around, so we should find out what – if anything – he saw.’

  ‘I will fetch him,’ offered Langelee. ‘Watching Albon has given me a headache, and I need some fresh air.’

  When the Master had gone, Bartholomew and Michael went to the chapel. It was a pretty building, although only large enough to hold about fifty people, so it was no surprise that the Lady aimed to stake a claim on the parish church. The chapel was full of her ancestors’ tombs, and was a dark, silent, intimate place.

  Heselbech was there, praying in the nave, although his nodding head and bowed shoulders suggested that his sleepless night was beginning to catch up with him. He turned at the sound of footsteps and heaved himself to his feet, yawning hugely as he did so.

  ‘Have you come to examine the bodies again?’ he asked. ‘Or to pay your respects?’

  ‘Neither,’ replied Michael. ‘We have come to talk to Albon. Where is he?’

  Heselbech led the way past the rood screen to the chancel, where the knight was on his knees before the High Altar, hands clasped reverently in front of him. On one side stood an ornate casket draped in green silk; on the other was a bier with handles, suggesting that Roos would not lie there for much longer. Albon was so still and poised that he might have been a statue, but then he sneezed, and spoiled his attitude of elegant piety by wiping his nose on his gauntlet.

  ‘He has come to pray for guidance, given that his first stab at identifying the culprit was unsuccessful,’ explained Heselbech. ‘I have been instructed to keep the place quiet, so he can concentrate. Of course, that may prove difficult, given that so many folk want to pay their last respects to Margery.’

  Bartholomew and Michael left him to it and approached the kneeling knight. Albon sneezed again, sniffed loudly, and this time it was his sleeve that cleaned his running nose.

  ‘How are your enquiries coming along?’ asked Michael, striding up behind him and catching him mid-scrub.

  ‘Slowly,’ replied Albon, blushing with mortification at being caught in the act of doing something so unmannerly. ‘But that will change once I have spoken to God. He will tell me what to do next.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Michael. ‘But what are your preliminary conclusions?’

  ‘I do not have any, Brother. I may be a novice in these matters, but I do know that it is unwise to begin with preconceptions.’

  ‘Preconceptions often serve me very well,’ countered Michael. ‘Along with hunches. Indeed, it is sometimes impossible to proceed very far without them.’

  Albon gave a pained smile. ‘Then I shall confess to you that one solution does keep coming to mind: that Mistress Marishal and Roos were killed by a townsman. You may have noticed that there is a very nasty feud in Clare.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Michael. ‘So where were you between nocturns and dawn?’

  ‘Why those particular times?’ asked Albon curiously. ‘Is it when the murders were committed? How did you discover that?’

  ‘The usual way – by asking pertinent questions of relevant witnesses.’

  Albon inclined his head. ‘Then thank you for sharing your discovery with a rival investigator. But to answer your question, I was here, in the chapel. I am about to embark on a holy quest to France, so I spend a lot of time communing with the Almighty.’

  ‘It is not a holy quest,’ argued Bartholomew, offended by the claim. ‘It is taking a lot of ruffians to join a war that we had no right starting in the first place.’

  Albon regarded him coolly. ‘I was called to service personally by the King, and he is God’s anointed. Thus it most certainly is a holy undertaking, and I am honoured to have been chosen.’

  ‘Did you see or hear anything suspicious at all?’ asked Michael, speaking before Bartholomew could inform him that this was a lot of convoluted claptrap. ‘This building is not far from the Cistern Tower – just a stone’s throw from one door to the other.’

  ‘If I had seen the killer commit his foul deed, I would already have hanged him,’ declared Albon, and turned his noble visage back to the altar, closed his eyes and re-clasped his hands. ‘Now, if you will excuse me, Brother, I must pray.’

  ‘I have nothing against piety,’ said Michael, a short while later, after Langelee had returned to say that the hermit was out and no one knew where he had gone. ‘But Albon is blinded by it, and it is not healthy. Let us hope we solve these murders, because he never will.’

  ‘Perhaps he does not want the killer caught,’ suggested Langelee. ‘Because then he can stay here on his knees, instead of leading a host of unruly louts to France. He is a coward, and is frightened now that the day of his departure looms. He wants a way to avoid it.’

  ‘I am glad he was not my commander at the Battle of Poitiers,’ said Bartholomew, inclined to think Langelee was right.

  ‘So am I,’ said Langelee fervently. ‘Because then you would not have survived to bring me back that lovely letter-opener. Albon is an ass, who does not know one end of a hauberk from—’

  He stopped speaking abruptly and rifled through his scrip, his face a mask of dismay. Then he pulled off his belt and began to pat himself down with increasing urgency.

  ‘What is the matter?’ asked Michael. ‘You cannot have lost our money – we do not have any.’

  ‘My letter-opener.’ Langelee’s voice was edged in panic. ‘Did one of you borrow it?’

  ‘Of course not,’ replied Bartholomew. ‘It is far too dangerous for the likes of us. I have told you countless times not to hone it so sharp.’

  ‘It has gone,’ gulped Langelee, tipping the contents of his scrip out and pawing through them frantically. ‘Someone has stolen it!’

  ‘Nicholas, probably,’ predicted Michael. ‘He covets the thing, and I doubt he believed your promise to send him one from Cambridge. These things have a way of being forgotten, no matter how sincere the intention at the time.’

  ‘Nicholas would never steal from me! We are old comrades-in-arms.’

  ‘No – you are both ex-soldiers,’ corrected Michael, ‘which is not the same thing at all. It would be like me saying that I share a bond with him, just because we are both in holy orders. He owes you no allegiance, just as he owes none to me.’

  ‘You lost it, Langelee,’ said Bartholomew quickly, disliking the notion of the Master storming up to the vicar and accusing him of theft.
‘Probably last night, when you were too drunk to notice. Retrace your steps – start with our room and the Prior’s House.’

  ‘I hope to God no one picks the wretched thing up and maims himself,’ said Michael, as Langelee sped away, worry creasing his bluff face. ‘You should never have given it to him.’

  ‘He adapted it,’ replied Bartholomew defensively. ‘It was an innocent little implement when I brought it back from France. Hah! There are Donwich and Pulham. That is convenient – I was about to suggest we speak to them next.’

  The scholars from Clare Hall did not look their best. Donwich had dark circles under his eyes, while Pulham kept yawning. They were unshaven, and wore the same clothes as they had the previous day, which were rumpled and spattered with ink. It was unusual for them be dishevelled, as both were fastidious men – and likely to be more so at Clare, where they aimed to impress their benefactress.

  ‘No, we did not sleep well,’ snapped Donwich in answer to the physician’s polite enquiry. ‘We rashly offered to help Marishal with preparations for the royal visit, and he ruthlessly exploited our good will. First, he ordered us to provide entertainment for the whole castle – which was not how we envisioned being put to use.’

  ‘You sang,’ said Michael, recalling that the baker had mentioned their warbling.

  ‘I felt like a common jongleur,’ said Donwich sourly.

  ‘I rather enjoyed it,’ countered Pulham. ‘I love singing, and we performed for hours, because folk kept clamouring for more. We did not finish until midnight.’ He grimaced. ‘I was ready for my bed at that point, but Marishal had other ideas.’

  ‘He has a mountain of correspondence pertaining to the Queen’s visit,’ elaborated Donwich, ‘and he wanted copies made of everything.’

  ‘Which is work for lowly clerks, not scholars of our standing,’ said Pulham sourly. ‘But they do not have time, so he asked us to do it instead. We dared not refuse, lest he complained to the Lady. We have only just finished.’