Susanna GREGORY - The Mark of a Murderer

‘Damn Clippesby,’ the monk muttered venomously when the thatched roofs of Stourbridge finally came into sight. ‘Why has he so suddenly taken it into his head to chew necks? He has never shown cannibalistic tendencies before.’

‘He may be innocent,’ said Bartholomew, although he could see the monk was unconvinced. ‘But you should put your question to Brother Paul, who has much more experience of insanity than I. He may tell you that this kind of violence is not a factor in Clippesby’s particular condition, and that we should be looking to another madman for our culprit.’

Michael knocked at the hospital’s gate, then looked around with interest as they were ushered inside. He did not visit Stourbridge often, and always forgot how impressed he was by its orderly cleanliness. ‘We shall see Paul first, and then …what in God’s name is he doing?’

‘That patient has acute lethargy, so Paul is attempting to cure her by setting her feet in salt water, ringing bells in her ears, and placing feathers under her nose to make her sneeze.’

Michael regarded him askance. ‘Will it work?’

Bartholomew shrugged. ‘Such a course of treatment has sound classical antecedents, although I am sure there must be gentler ways to treat her, as yet undiscovered. In a moment, he will put the feather in her throat to induce retching, then he will bleed her, to rid her of excessive humours.’

‘We should talk to him before he starts, then,’ said Michael hastily. ‘I am already covered in mud, and I do not want to be sprayed with blood and vomit, too.’

‘What do you think?’ asked Brother Paul worriedly, when he saw Bartholomew approaching. ‘Does she seem any better to you?’

Bartholomew considered. ‘No. She seems more listless than ever. But intensive humoral therapy is exhausting, so perhaps you should allow her more rest between sessions.’

Paul regarded his charge with sad eyes. ‘We can try, I suppose, since nothing else seems to be working. What about electuaries and embrocations? Can you recommend any that might help?’

Bartholomew shook his head slowly. ‘Ailments of the mind are a complete mystery to me, and all my training and experience seem to count for nothing when I meet cases like these. You are far wiser about them than I, and you should trust what your own instincts tell you to do.’

‘My instincts are failing me dismally at the moment.’ Paul nodded at the drooping woman who sat disconsolately, with her legs in a bucket and a down scarf around her neck. ‘I make no headway with her, while Clippesby is entirely beyond my skills. I misjudge him at every turn.’

Bartholomew regarded him in alarm. ‘What is the matter? Has he harmed someone? Or himself?’

‘No, no,’ said Paul quickly. ‘Nothing like that. But he seems recovered one moment, and mad the next. I cannot make him out. I trust him completely to help with the others – he is patient and gentle with even the most vicious and ungrateful of them – but he seems unable to follow orders about his own well-being. And he will insist on quitting the hospital, when he knows he must stay. He left us again on Tuesday evening – he was gone when I looked in his room after dusk, but was back for prime on Wednesday morning. I beg him not to wander off in the dark, but he cannot seem to help himself.’

Bartholomew and Michael exchanged a glance: so, it could have been Clippesby who had attacked Bartholomew with the spade. Nervously, Bartholomew wondered what else he might have done.

‘Did you ask where he had been?’ asked Michael.

‘He does not know,’ said Paul tiredly. ‘He is not lying – he really does have no idea. There is not much more I can do for him, Matt, other than offer company, a little recreational work and a safe haven – which will not be very safe if he continues to escape.’

‘How does he get out?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘I thought you locked his door at night, and his window has mullions that are impossible to squeeze through.’

‘I forgot to bar the door,’ said Paul apologetically. ‘I was busy. Ned Tucker was dying and Clippesby slipped my mind. It was my fault, but I am sorry he took advantage of my lapse. Speak to him, and explain again that he is here for his own good.’

While Paul turned his attention to the unresponsive woman, Bartholomew and Michael looked for Clippesby. He was not in the peaceful little chapel, saying prayers for Ned Tucker like many other inmates, nor was he in the kitchen helping to prepare the next meal. Next to the church was a large dormitory that contained the beds of those who required constant care; the fitter residents slept in smaller buildings, some of which could be locked to ensure they did not escape to harm themselves or others. It was in the hall that they found Clippesby, reading to a patient who was in the last stages of a disease that had ravaged his face. He raised his finger to his lips when Bartholomew and Michael entered, and continued speaking. It was only when the man slept that Clippesby left him.

He looked healthy and cheerful, and his eyes had lost the wild expression that had so unnerved Bartholomew the day after Rougham had been attacked. He had combed his hair, so it lay flat and even across his tonsured pate, his face was shaved to a rosy pinkness, and his habit was scrupulously clean. It was difficult to see him as a deranged lunatic who bit the necks of his victims and wielded spades in dark churches. He smiled at Bartholomew, then clasped Michael’s hand.

‘It is good to see Michaelhouse men,’ he said, leading them to his own room so that their voices would not disturb the sleeping leper. ‘It is dull here, with no one of any intelligence to speak to. Paul is always too busy or too tired, and most of the others are beyond caring about decent conversation.’

‘I am sorry you have to be here,’ said Bartholomew sincerely. ‘But Paul tells me you made a bid for freedom on Tuesday night and were gone until dawn the following day. Why?’

Clippesby shrugged. ‘Why do you think? I have been here fifteen days now, and I am bored. I went for a walk, although I cannot tell you where. I just followed a mouse.’

‘A mouse,’ said Michael flatly.

‘Well, a field mouse, naturally,’ elaborated Clippesby. ‘But you would know that, of course. One is hardly likely to find a dormouse with time on her hands at this time of year!’ He laughed, to indicate he considered the notion preposterous.

‘Did this mouse eventually lead you to Cambridge?’ asked Michael. ‘To St Michael’s?’

‘I do not recall,’ replied Clippesby. ‘I was too absorbed in what she had to tell me.’

‘And what was that?’ asked Michael suspiciously. ‘It was nothing to do with the gnawing of throats, was it? Or the wielding of spades?’

‘Hardly!’ said Clippesby, startled. ‘Her conversation was rather more genteel, and involved a discussion between St Benedict and his holy sister St Scholastica three days before her death.’

‘Scholastica?’ echoed Michael immediately. ‘Did this mouse mention riots, by any chance? On Scholastica’s feast day in Oxford?’

‘She did, but those are of scant importance when compared to the dialogue between the two mystics. I am sure you are aware, Brother, that no one knows exactly what was discussed the night Scholastica summoned a great storm to keep her brother from returning to his monastery – so he would stay with her. But the mouse knew.’

‘This mouse must be a considerable age,’ said Bartholomew, amused. ‘This alleged conversation is said to have taken place eight hundred years ago.’

‘She did not hear it herself,’ said Clippesby, irritated by the lack of understanding. ‘It was witnessed by an ancestor, and the information has been passed through the family from century to century. The same sort of thing happens with humans. Generations of first-born Clippesbys have been called John, to name but one example.’