Susanna GREGORY - Mystery in the Minster

‘This is what Cynric was doing when Marmaduke found him,’ gasped Bartholomew, grabbing the spade and hacking away the packed earth. ‘He–’

‘Then he had no business,’ snapped Ellis. ‘It might release the Death into York a second time. Come down at once, or I shall summon the minster guards and have you arrested.’

‘He is right, Matt,’ said Michael uncomfortably, sure the physician had lost his wits. ‘The last thing we need is another outbreak of the disease. That will certainly not help Cynric.’

Bartholomew ignored them both, his breath coming in sharp bursts as he intensified his efforts, certain he was about to discover a clue that would tell him where Marmaduke had taken his friend.

‘Enough!’ commanded Ellis, irate enough to clamber up the pile after him. ‘You have no right to disturb the dead.’

‘Someone is buried in here,’ rasped Bartholomew. ‘It is–’

‘Of course someone is buried,’ snarled Ellis, reaching out to drag him away. Bartholomew jigged free. ‘The whole thing is a tomb!’

‘The plague dead will be skeletons.’ Struggling to stay out of grabbing distance and dig at the same time, Bartholomew managed to expose a leg. He fought not to gag as the stench of putrefaction rose around him. ‘Look! This is much more recent – no more than a few weeks. It is why there has always been such a rank odour here.’

‘From the animals!’ shouted Ellis, lunging again. ‘The Dean keeps asking the vergers to remove them, but they pretend to forget. I do not blame them: toting maggot-ridden pigs and cats is–’

‘I suspect they were brought here at the same time as this man,’ interrupted Bartholomew, scrambling to where the corpse’s head should be. ‘To disguise any odour emanating from him.’

‘This is nonsense!’ yelled Ellis. He tried to drag the physician away, but Michael seized the hem of his cloak and yanked him back. ‘Your behaviour is disgraceful. I will see you fined so heavily that you will beg me to take Huntington, to pay the price of–’

‘There!’ said Bartholomew, stepping aside suddenly. He had exposed the face of a man who had possessed a shock of thick grey hair, although its time in the mound had turned it filthy and tangled. The skin was dark with decay, but not enough to make him unrecognisable to anyone who had known him in life.

‘Cotyngham!’ exclaimed Ellis in astonishment. ‘What in God’s name is he doing here? He is supposed to be in the Franciscan Priory.’

There was silence after Ellis’s blurted announcement. In the distance, bells rang, but it was not a time when offices should be said, so Bartholomew could only suppose they were sounding an alarm. Perhaps the tide had started to surge, and people were being warned to head for higher ground. Would St Mary ad Valvas be safe, or would its crumbling walls be swept away by the encroaching waters?

‘It cannot be Cotyngham,’ said Michael. ‘He escaped from the friary two nights ago, but Matt says this fellow has been dead for weeks.’

‘It is Cotyngham,’ said Ellis shakily. ‘I recognise his hair and the ring on his finger.’

‘Then who was staying with the Franciscans?’ asked Michael.

‘An imposter,’ said Bartholomew heavily. ‘It makes perfect sense now. But never mind this. We need to look for Cynric.’

‘Look where?’ demanded Michael. ‘This is a vast city, and we have no idea where to begin. Our best chance of helping him is to assess what we know of Cotyngham – Cynric was excavating him when he was captured, so understanding what brought him here in the first place may point us in the right direction.’

Bartholomew was unconvinced, but took a deep breath to calm himself, and began to speak. ‘When Cotyngham was first taken ill, Fournays ordered him kept in isolation – we were allowed in, but only because Stayndrop was beginning to accept that seclusion was not working.’

‘And because you are a physician,’ added Michael, while Ellis looked from one to the other in confusion. ‘But we had never met Cotyngham, so were not in a position to know whether it was him or not. Stayndrop also admitted to knowing him only slightly, while Fournays told you that he did not know him at all.’

‘I thought there was something odd about the case from the start,’ Bartholomew went on. ‘When we first saw him, “Cotyngham” was blank-eyed and drooling, but his heart was racing. Now I know why: the imposter was terrified that he was about to be unmasked.’

‘We were the first visitors Stayndrop had allowed in. His fear was understandable.’

‘The second time I saw him, he was breathless.’ Every fibre in Bartholomew’s body screamed at him to begin tearing the city apart, and it was not easy to talk calmly. ‘Probably because he had had to rush to don his disguise. I imagine these two incidents prompted his flight…’

Michael nodded. ‘It is one thing to lounge in isolation, comfortably housed and fed, but he was unwilling to risk himself once Stayndrop started admitting visitors. And it explains why Oustwyk saw a “Cotyngham” who was fleet-footed enough to give him the slip.’

‘So what does this tell us?’ asked Bartholomew, struggling to keep his voice steady. ‘That Cotyngham died when Ellis and Cave visited him a month ago, and they buried him here? And then installed an imposter in the friary?’

‘No!’ cried Ellis, his face white. ‘Cotyngham was perfectly well when we left him.’

‘But Cave left part of his shoelace in Cotyngham’s chimney,’ snapped Bartholomew. ‘He must have been searching for the codicil…’ He faltered, thinking about what Jorden had claimed.

‘And Cotyngham would not have granted such a liberty if he was alive,’ said Michael quickly, unwilling to share that particular snippet of information with the sub-chanter just yet. ‘ Ergo , Cave must have known that Cotyngham was dead.’

‘The lace may have been left after we had learned Cotyngham was ill,’ Ellis flashed back. ‘Cotyngham was not in a position to refuse permission then, either. You cannot use it to prove that Cave knew the man was dead. Or to prove that he killed him, lest you think to try.’

But Bartholomew disagreed. ‘You began proceedings to claim Huntington the moment Cotyngham was installed in the infirmary, at a point when there was no reason to assume he would not recover. The only logical explanation is that you knew he would never be in a position to resume his duties. Moreover, there is the testimony of Huntington’s villagers.’

‘What testimony?’ demanded Ellis uneasily.

‘They cleaned his cottage, because they said it smelled, yet Cotyngham kept it neat. I suspect the odour was from his corpse, moved shortly before they were informed that “Cotyngham” was in the infirmary.’ Anxiety for Cynric made Bartholomew brusque. ‘What did you do? Hire someone to impersonate him while you devised a plan that would exonerate you of murder?’

‘No!’ cried Ellis. ‘We have never–’

‘Wait,’ said Michael, cutting across him, and addressing Bartholomew. ‘Keeping Cotyngham secluded was a treatment recommended by Fournays.’

‘No,’ groaned Bartholomew, unwilling to go over old ground. ‘Fournays did not kill Cot–’

‘Hear me out! By his own admission, Fournays has scant experience with ailments of the mind. He was at a loss as to what to do. Then who should come along, to tell him about an uncle who had suffered a similar complaint, and who had been cured by being kept in isolation?’

‘Marmaduke!’ exclaimed Bartholomew.

‘Precisely. And Fournays acted on this advice, being a suggestible, malleable sort of fellow.’

Ellis shook his head in incomprehension. ‘Are you saying that Marmaduke killed Cotyngham and buried him here? And Cave is innocent?’