A Wicked Deed (21 page)
Authors: Susanna Gregory
Tags: #Mystery, #Historical, #blt, #rt, #Cambridge, #England, #Medieval, #Clergy
Seeing he would not prevail against such firmly entrenched ideas, Michael nodded noncommittally, and took Bartholomew’s arm to lead him away. He was obliged to tug fairly insistently when the physician indicated that he wanted to linger and speak a little longer to the lovely wife of their benefactor. Isilia declined Bartholomew’s offer to escort her back to Wergen Hall, although she did so with some reluctance, clearly considering the prospect of spending
some time in the company of intriguing strangers more appealing than walking with her mother-in-law. Eventually, they parted, the ladies to Wergen Hall, and the scholars to the Half Moon, so that Michael could exchange his heavy habit for a lighter one. At the same time, the monk took the opportunity to order some bread and cheese to fortify him for the questioning that lay ahead.
It was pleasantly cool in the Half Moon’s upper chamber. The sky was an almost flawless blue, with only a line of pearl-grey clouds low on the horizon marring its perfection, and sunlight streamed into every corner of the room. Bartholomew flung the window – still latchless from the landlord’s efforts of the previous night – open as far as it would go, and leaned out to inhale deeply a breeze rich with the scent of flowers and cut grass. Blackbirds sang loudly, one perched on the very highest twig of one of the mighty elms that stood in the churchyard. In the distance, cuckoos called, while on the hills the bleat of lambs was answered by the deeper grumble of ewes. It did not seem like the kind of day that should be spent investigating a murder.
‘You believe the stories about these ghosts, don’t you?’ asked Michael, stuffing bread into his mouth as he waited for Bartholomew to finish mending his spare shirt – torn when the robbers on the Old Road had chased him through the undergrowth – so that he could look reasonably respectable when they went to question the villagers. ‘You, a man of science and reason, accept that there is a spectral canine trotting around Suffolk driving people to their deaths?’
‘It just seems a coincidence that Unwin saw a white dog that no one else did, and that the hanged man whispered the name “Padfoot” with his dying breath.’
‘You have not mentioned this dying word before,’ said Michael dubiously. ‘Are you sure you heard it correctly?’
Bartholomew nodded. ‘It was an odd word, and it stuck in
my mind. I did not mention it before, simply because I did not understand its significance.’
‘And what is its significance?’
Bartholomew shrugged. ‘That Unwin saw this dog, and that now he is dead.’
‘You should not have eaten those vegetables last night, Matt – they are interfering with your powers of reason!’
Bartholomew sighed. ‘Perhaps Tuddenham is right, and Unwin was killed just because a drunken reveller wanted to steal his purse. But what if theft were not the motive? What if it were something to do with this dog? We should keep an open mind about these folktales – there may be some grain of truth in them. And, therefore, I think we should talk to the families of the other two people who died after seeing this dog – the butcher and the woman who died of childbirth fever.’
‘As you pointed out to me only yesterday, Matt, we have no authority to pry into village affairs. Unwin’s death is a different matter – he was a friar, and as such his murder should be investigated by an agent of the Church. But these other deaths are none of our business.’
‘But what if Tuddenham is involved in them?’
Michael gave a laugh of disbelief. ‘Now you are allowing your imagination to gain the better of your common sense.’
‘Then why is he so keen to give Michaelhouse the living of the church? You said yourself that such gifts are usually to atone for a sin. We should discover what this sin is before we accept it.’
‘But there is nothing to suggest that this sin – if there is a sin – has anything to do with happenings in the village. Anyway, you heard Tuddenham suggest that the gift was to ensure the health of his unborn child.’
‘How do we know he is not lying?’
Michael sighed. ‘We do not. But even if he is, it is not for us to deny him an opportunity to make his peace with God
by refusing his advowson. Besides, if we do not take it, he will only give it to someone else – he might even approach the Hall of Valence Marie or Corpus Christi, and then where would we be?’
‘But it is one thing to accept a gift from a contrite sinner, and wholly different to accept one from a man who offers it while he continues his crimes.’
‘Alcote will look into that while he is trawling Tuddenham’s personal documents – and you know how meticulous
he
can be. If there is anything untoward written down, he will find it.’
‘But things like this are never written down,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Alcote will find nothing.’
‘Then there is no problem,’ said Michael. ‘But I am sure Unwin’s death has nothing to do with Tuddenham’s deed. You are trying to complicate a simple situation: Tuddenham is giving us the church because he lost three sons to the Death, and he wants to curry favour with the saints to protect his unborn child; meanwhile, Unwin was the victim of an opportunistic thief. The other two deaths, plus our hanged man, have nothing to do with any of it, and this ghostly dog of yours is rank superstition.’
Bartholomew leaned on the windowsill and rubbed a hand through his hair. Michael was almost certainly right, and he was giving the motive for Unwin’s death a significance it did not have. Tuddenham’s eagerness to have his advowson completed quickly was probably nothing more sinister than an attempt to secure allies in Michaelhouse before Deblunville took him to the courts over the disputed land near Peche Hall.
He broke the thread on the patch he had just sewn, and began to pull the shirt over his head. ‘So, what do we have left? There is the black knight – Grosnold – seen talking “surreptitiously” to Unwin after Grosnold is supposed to have gone home; and we have the cloaked figure seen by
Stoate leaving the church just before Horsey found Unwin dead. Either one of those two might have killed him.’
‘I cannot see why Grosnold would want to kill his neighbour’s new priest,’ said Michael doubtfully. ‘He seems to be one of the few people Tuddenham likes.’
‘Nevertheless, our landlord saw him with Unwin shortly before Unwin died,’ said Bartholomew. ‘If we can believe a word Eltisley says, that is.’
Michael agreed. ‘We might be allowing Eltisley to mislead us with his story. Whilst I do not think he is lying, I also do not know that he is telling the truth. If you spend too much time in a different reality from everyone else, the distinction between truth and falsehood eventually blurs.’
‘I suppose we should bear his story in mind, though,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Along with the fact that Unwin and Grosnold met in Otley, and Unwin refused to tell me what they had discussed together. We should also talk to Will Norys, the pardoner. Mother Goodman tells me that he deals with relics, and he may have heard something about the one that was stolen from Unwin.’
‘A pardoner?’ asked Michael, sitting upright, good humour gone. ‘Pardoners are a loathsome breed of vipers who prey on the vulnerability and fears of the poor and foolish; rancid excuses for men who should not be allowed to taint the lives of honest folk. Evil, sinful agents of the Devil …’
‘You do not like them, then?’ remarked Bartholomew, who knew very well Michael did not.
The monk glared at him. ‘They are carrion who ply their repulsive trade—’
‘I take your point,’ said Bartholomew, raising his hand to stem the flow of invective. ‘Perhaps I should visit Norys alone, in view of your feelings. I would not like there to be another murder.’
‘Do not worry,’ said Michael disdainfully. ‘I would not sully my innocent hands with the black blood of a pardoner.’ He
mused. ‘So, we have the pardoner to question, and we need to find out whether Grosnold returned to the village after we all saw him leave.’
Bartholomew nodded. ‘And then, in the interests of thoroughness, we will talk to the families of the two dead villagers, just to prove your contention that they are unrelated to Unwin’s murder.’
Michael sighed gustily. ‘You are in one of your stubborn moods, I see. Well, whoever killed Unwin – which was done with the sole intention of stealing the purse – is probably stupid enough to try to sell the relic it contained. We will catch him easily. And that will be the end of the matter.’
Bartholomew remained unconvinced. ‘Why risk eternal damnation by killing a friar in a church, when anyone looking at Unwin would see he is not wealthy: his robe is threadbare, one of his sandals is broken, and he is a mendicant. Why not aim for Alcote, wearing that big golden cross? Or why not me, carrying a bag that could contain all sorts of valuables?’
‘Probably because neither of you were alone yesterday. Or, as you have already suggested, perhaps Unwin caught the culprit doing something he should not have been doing, and was killed to ensure his silence. His purse was then stolen because it was there.’ He stood and opened the door. ‘Did I mention that Tuddenham has asked us to organise a debate for the entertainment and edification of the Grundisburgh villagers?’
‘I am sure they will be thrilled by that prospect,’ said Bartholomew dryly.
‘Father William thinks it an excellent idea – far better than fairs and feasts.’
‘He would,’ muttered Bartholomew.
‘I managed to persuade Tuddenham that Alcote taking part in the debate would interfere with the writing of the advowson,’ said Michael, sounding pleased with himself. ‘You know what a bore he can be at debates with his
flawed logic, and his “anyone-who-does-not-agree-with-me-is-stupid” reasoning. The villagers will enjoy the occasion far more if Alcote does not take part. But we should not be standing here chatting: we have a murderer to catch.’
But it was not as easy to catch a murderer as Michael had predicted. While he asked the villagers they met about the person Stoate had seen leaving the church, Bartholomew enquired whether anyone had seen Grosnold after he had made his dramatic exit across the green on his destrier. Neither line of enquiry met with much positive response. Most of the villagers tried to be helpful, but none had anything to say that was of any import. A few seemed nervous or sullen, but Bartholomew could not blame them for being wary of any involvement in an enquiry regarding the death of a priest.
The investigation took another downward turn when William tracked them down and proudly placed his powers of detection at their disposal. It did not take a genius to deduce that Alcote had regretted keeping William near him for protection – even a murderer at large, apparently, was preferable to the friar’s dour company.
Their spirits sank further still when William told them that Alcote had found some of Tuddenham’s documents to be so old and faded that it was not possible to decipher them properly. Since the advowson needed to be based on accurate information if it were to last, Tuddenham had dispatched his priest, Wauncy, to Ipswich to acquire copies. Bartholomew groaned, anticipating that Alcote’s exactitude would cost them days, and they would be later than ever in returning to Cambridge. William, however, assured them that any delay caused by Wauncy’s trip was unlikely to be serious: Wauncy would not linger while there were pennies to be earned from saying masses for Grundisburgh’s dead, and the facts to be checked against the newer texts were relatively minor.
‘I suppose you can come with us when we question this
pardoner,’ said Michael to William reluctantly. ‘I do not mind you exercising your nasty inquisitional skills on him.’
‘Will Norys?’ asked the villager whom Michael had just finished questioning. ‘He works in Ipswich on Tuesdays. You will have to catch him tomorrow.’
‘Damn!’ muttered Michael, who had evidently been looking forward to venting some of his frustration and spleen on a man whose trade he loathed.
And so, with William at their heels, they continued with their questions, each time gaining the same response: no one had seen anything amiss, and everyone was appalled by the brutal death of the man who was to have been their parish priest. Everyone, however, had heard that Unwin had set eyes on the spectre of Padfoot, and so few professed themselves surprised by the young friar’s demise, horrified though they were by the manner of it.
The scholars returned to the Half Moon that evening tired and dispirited. As he undressed for bed, questions tumbled around in Bartholomew’s exhausted mind. Who would want to kill Unwin? Was the culprit Grosnold, seen talking to him ‘surreptitiously’ by Eltisley after the feast and by Bartholomew in the castle bailey at Otley? Or was it the mysterious figure seen running from the church by Stoate the physician? What might the pardoner know about a relic that might have been offered for sale in the last day or so? And what of the white dog, which had so many of the villagers terrified out of their wits?
B
EFORE DAYBREAK THE FOLLOWING MORNING, BARTHOLOMEW
and Michael were waiting on the path that led from the village to the fields, hoping to speak to the people who were away from the village each day from dawn to dusk working the land. As the sky began to lighten, men, women and even children trudged wearily towards them, hoes and spades over their shoulders, their footsteps slow and unwilling. Although all seemed well-fed and healthy enough, it was a hard and dull life, and most were delighted to stop and talk to the Michaelhouse scholars, to break the monotony of toiling among Tuddenham’s ripening crops.
Many seemed to be exhausted before they even started, and yawned and stretched as they answered Michael’s patient questions. Bartholomew wondered whether the celebrations for the Pentecost Fair had extended longer than Tuddenham knew.
No one had anything of value to add regarding Unwin’s death. Most had spotted him at the Fair – they had been interested to see him because he was to have been their priest – but none had noticed him enter the church, or observed him speaking to anyone in particular before he died. They seemed genuinely appalled that a friar had been murdered in their village, but all declared that it was only to be expected once Unwin had set eyes on Padfoot. Michael tried in vain to convince them that Unwin had seen only a stray dog, but, although they listened politely, it was obvious they did not concur.
By noon, Michael and Bartholomew had spoken to dozens of people, but had learned nothing. Disgusted, Michael led the way back to Grundisburgh to interview the pardoner, leaving the neat strips of yellow and their dusty guardians behind. The village was peaceful. Those not in the fields were tending the sheep on the hills or minding the cows that grazed on the common land near the church. Two children laughed as they shepherded a flock of white geese along The Street, and somewhere a baby cried as a mother tried to sing it to sleep. Smoke seeped through the roofs of one or two huts where those too old or too ill to work had been left to do the cooking, but most homes were still and silent, and would be so until their owners returned after sunset that day.
As they passed the Dog tavern they saw Hamon inside, drinking deeply from a huge jug. He spotted them through the window and beckoned them over, wiping his lips on his sleeve as he set the empty vessel on the table.
‘I spoke with the Sheriffs deputy this morning,’ he said without preamble. ‘He said he was happy that my uncle is doing all in his power to trace Unwin’s killer, and has placed the matter officially in his hands.’
‘You mean the deputy has been and gone?’ asked Michael in horror. ‘He did not even bother to pay his respects to me – the Bishop’s agent and his representative in canon law?’
‘You only represent the Bishop of Ely. This is the See of the Bishop of Norwich so, as far as the Sheriff is concerned, you have no authority here. We do not think that, of course,’ Hamon added quickly, when he saw the monk’s face darken.
Bartholomew was disgusted. ‘So the Sheriff does not care that a priest has been murdered in his shire?’
Hamon shrugged. ‘He is a busy man, and is more concerned with catching the outlaws who operate along the Old Road, than in wasting valuable time in duplicating the work my uncle is doing.’
‘Investigating the murder of a priest is a waste of no one’s time,’ snapped Michael. He sat next to Hamon. ‘This has made me quite weak at the knees. Landlord! Bring the some wine. And perhaps also a chicken, if you have one to hand.’
Hamon grinned, openly amused by Michael’s transparent greed, and then stood. ‘I must go. Since the Death, the village has been desperately short of labourers, and I have been forced to hire those sullen men who are staying at the Half Moon. If I do not supervise them constantly, they do not work.’
‘They sound like my students,’ muttered Michael. He nodded with approval as the food arrived, and Bartholomew sat next to him, tired after the long, fruitless morning.
‘Damn that Sheriff!’ said Michael, as he tore a leg from a chicken. ‘Dick Tulyet would never delegate the murder of a friar to some local landowner. It is not right!’
‘I do not like it,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Tuddenham is now under considerable obligation to solve Unwin’s murder. I hope he does not manipulate the truth, and end up with a scapegoat rather than the real culprit.’
Michael sighed. ‘You are far too suspicious and untrusting these days. You were not like this five years ago. Even I accept that people occasionally tell the truth and have motives that are honourable. But we should hurry. I want to catch that pardoner before he slinks off to ply his foul trade in Ipswich again.’
On their way to Norys’s house, Bartholomew and Michael passed the latrine, where Eltisley the landlord was engaged in something that entailed a good deal of muttering and the frenzied use of heavy tools. The latrine was a splendid affair – as such structures went – and Eltisley had spent some time over dinner the previous evening explaining how he had built it, announcing proudly that it served most of the village. It comprised a low shed built over a trench that, as far as Bartholomew could tell, then drained straight through
the soil into the river at precisely the point where most people collected their drinking water. It had three stalls, each with a separate door to ensure privacy – a feature seldom seen outside monasteries or palaces.
Eltisley had a hefty awl in his hand, and was busily hacking a hole the size of a plum in one of the doors, muttering to himself as he did so.
‘What is he doing?’ asked Michael curiously, pausing to look.
‘Do not ask,’ said Bartholomew, taking his arm and trying to walk past the landlord without becoming engaged in a lengthy conversation. ‘As I have already told you, I do not think Eltisley is quite in control of his faculties. And that is my professional medical opinion.’
‘He is probably going to sit there and look for that ghostly dog of yours through the hole he is making,’ said Michael with an unpleasant snigger.
‘What do you think of this?’ called Eltisley, just as Bartholomew thought they had escaped. ‘Come and see.’
‘Oh, Lord!’ groaned Bartholomew. ‘Now we shall be here all day listening to some peculiar theory about latrine architecture.’
‘You do not like him very much, do you?’ said Michael, as they walked towards Eltisley.
‘I do not like him at all,’ said Bartholomew. ‘He is dangerous. He told me last night he has a cure for palsies that involves drowning a patient, and then reviving him. He is planning to try it on some poor child in Otley. I told Stoate about it, and hope to God he manages to intervene in time.’
‘No physician likes a patient who knows more medicine than he does,’ observed Michael complacently, beaming at the landlord as they reached the latrines.
Bartholomew ignored him, and looked to where Eltisley was gesturing with barely concealed excitement. For some
reason he had chopped holes in each of the three doors, and was waving some kind of device at them with evident pride.
‘It is a latch I have designed myself,’ he said enthusiastically. ‘It will mean that the door can be locked from the inside and, as the bar drops, its weight will turn a mechanism so that the metal facing the outside will turn to this part that has been painted red.’
‘Ingenious,’ said Michael, bemused. ‘But what is it for? If you are inside operating the lock, you will not be able to see whether the metal outside is red or not.’
‘It is to warn people outside that the stall is temporarily unavailable,’ said Eltisley primly. ‘Then no one will be in the terrible position of being inside, while someone on the outside is frantically pulling on the handle to get in.’
‘Well, that is a relief,’ said Michael, struggling to keep a straight face. ‘I shall rest easier in my bed knowing that.’
‘The only problem is that I cannot get the device to stay in the doors without falling out,’ said Eltisley, scratching his head. ‘So, I suppose I will have to rethink the design.’
He began to walk away, taking his mechanism with him.
‘All is not lost,’ Bartholomew called to his retreating back.
‘No one will need to rattle the handles now that you have placed these convenient holes in the doors – we can just look through them and immediately see whether someone is inside or not. No one will ever be embarrassed by unwanted rattling again.’
Michael roared with laughter, leaving Eltisley looking from his device to the doors in some confusion. Bartholomew shook his head in disgust.
‘See what I mean? He has damaged three perfectly good doors in order to try out some unworkable mechanism, thus leaving everything in a worse state than it was in before. I am surprised that latrine is still standing, given that he built it.’
‘Ah, but he did not,’ said Michael. ‘I admit I was impressed
when I first saw it, and I mentioned it to Tuddenham. Apparently, Wauncy designed it, Hamon supervised the building of it, and all Eltisley did was to select the site.’
‘So that explains why it drains into the river just where the people collect their drinking water,’ said Bartholomew. ‘The man is a liability.’
‘It is unlike you to take such an irrational dislike to someone,’ said Michael, laughing at the physician’s vehemence. ‘Poor Eltisley! He is not that bad.’
‘Here he comes again!’ hissed Bartholomew in alarm, gripping Michael’s arm as the landlord stopped, turned and began to walk back towards them. ‘Quick, Michael, run!’
He took the monk’s arm and hauled him away before the eccentric landlord could catch them, Michael gasping and puffing as laughter made it difficult for him to move at the pace Bartholomew was forcing. Fortunately, it was not far to the small wattle-and-daub house with the reed roof that belonged to the tanner. He sat in his garden with a workbench between his knees, scraping at a hide with a piece of pumice stone.
The smell from his workshop was overpowering, just as Mother Goodman had warned – a combination of the urine and polish used to tan the leather, and a thick stench of rotting as newly prepared pelts were stretched to dry in the sun. He looked up as they approached, and gave a grin. Bartholomew was startled to see the Tuddenham teeth – long, yellow and not very functional. Some lord of the manor, perhaps even Sir Thomas himself, although he would have been very young, had evidently been active among the village maidens.
‘New soles?’ asked the tanner hopefully. ‘Broken straps? Uncomfortable saddle that needs softening?’
‘All saddles are uncomfortable,’ said Bartholomew. ‘But we came to speak to your nephew, Will Norys. Is he in?’
The tanner looked disappointed. ‘He is preparing himself
for Ipswich market. Walter Wauncy has forbidden him to sell his pardons here, so he travels to the city to work most days.’
‘He is leaving rather late, is he not?’ asked Michael. ‘The market will be almost over by the time he arrives.’
The tanner grinned. ‘He came home very late last night.’
He tapped the side of his nose and winked conspiratorially.
‘He was enjoying the company of young Mistress Freeman.’
‘Can we go in?’ asked Michael, pushing open the garden gate and making his way to the door of the house. He was inside before the startled tanner had nodded his assent. Bartholomew followed quickly, afraid that Michael might lose his temper at the mere sight of a man who dealt in the trade that Michael despised with all his heart.
The tanner’s cottage was dark, and smelled strongly of cats. The window shutters appeared to have been painted closed, so it was difficult to see. After a moment, Bartholomew’s eyes grew used to the gloom and he made out a sturdy table standing on one side of the room, and two straw mattresses on the other. The beds were heaped with blankets, and both were alive with cats. There were also cats on the table and up in the rafters, while more rubbed themselves round his legs and tripped him as he followed Michael inside.
‘Perhaps
this
is what your white dog wants,’ the monk muttered. ‘It is a hound’s paradise in here.’ He sneezed three times in quick succession.
‘A sign of good luck, Brother,’ came a sibilant voice from a dark corner.
‘I beg your pardon?’ demanded Michael nasally.
‘To sneeze three times is a sign of good luck,’ said the voice. ‘It means someone will give you a present. Of course, a cat sneezing three times means that its owner will soon have an ague.’
‘There is a new theory for your treatise on fevers, Matt,’ said Michael, dabbing at his nose with a small piece of linen.
He peered into the room. ‘Will Norys? Come out, where I can see you.’
‘Have you come for a pardon?’ A small figure emerged from what Bartholomew had assumed was just another pile of cats.
‘We most certainly have not,’ said Michael indignantly. ‘I can do all the pardoning I need myself, thank you very much.’
‘Of course, Brother,’ hissed the pardoner. ‘If it is new leather you want, my uncle is outside.’
Michael sneezed twice, but Norys said nothing – perhaps two sneezes was not a good omen.
‘Perhaps we should stand outside,’ said Bartholomew after Michael’s sixth sneeze. Norys shrugged, and followed them into the garden. He had a round face and vivid green eyes. Unlike his uncle, he had tiny, rather pointed teeth, which he had a habit of running his tongue over in a furtive flicking movement. Bartholomew was sure he was not the first person to note the similarity between Norys and his feline friends.
‘Do you sell relics, by any chance?’ asked Michael, dabbing his nose fastidiously with his linen. ‘Only we would like to purchase a souvenir from our visit to Suffolk for the Master of our College, and I thought something of St Botolph’s might be suitable.’
‘I do have some relics,’ said Norys, moving towards the monk as he sensed a sale, ‘but nothing from St Botolph. He is popular around here, given his history. I can do you a fingernail of St Cuthbert, and I have a piece of the bowl in which Pontius Pilate washed his hands.’
‘Really?’ asked Bartholomew, puzzled. ‘Why would anyone want to buy something belonging to Pontius Pilate? He was scarcely on the side of the good and the just.’
‘People will buy just about anything these days,’ said Norys confidentially. ‘I heard of a man in Norwich who paid ten marks for a rib-bone of the whale that ate Elijah.’
