Susanna GREGORY - The Hand of Justice

Bartholomew hauled Warde away from the flailing hoofs, while Michael snatched the reins from Mortimer’s inept hands and attempted to calm the horses.

‘Watch where you are going!’ Warde shouted furiously, fright making him uncharacteristically aggressive. He leaned close to the miller, taking in the bloodshot eyes and glazed expression, before pointing an accusing finger. ‘You are drunk!’

‘I am not,’ slurred Mortimer. All three scholars were treated to a waft of breath thick with the fruity scent of ale as he spoke. ‘I have only rinsed the dust from my throat. Ferrying bales of cloth from the quays to my fulling mill is thirsty work.’

Michael was unimpressed. ‘Then rinse it with weaker ale,’ he snapped. ‘You cannot careen all across the street as if you are the only man using it.’

Infuriated by the reprimand, Mortimer snatched the reins from the monk and flicked them sharply so that the leather cracked across the horses’ flanks. One reared again, then both took off at a rapid canter. Bartholomew watched them go, then turned to Warde. The Valence Marie Fellow was a tall man with yellow-grey hair that he kept well oiled with goose fat. He had a reputation for brilliant scholarship and boundless patience with his students, and the physician both liked and admired him.

‘I have had a tickling throat for the past week,’ said Warde with a rueful smile. ‘But the shock of near-death under Mortimer’s wheels has quite put it from my mind: I no longer feel the urge to cough. Perhaps he has cured me. Or perhaps the prayers I have offered to sacred relics for my recovery have finally been answered. However, I can assure you that my relief has nothing to do with the potions Rougham prescribed for me. I should never have engaged him over you, Bartholomew.’

‘Then why did you?’ asked Michael bluntly. ‘Matt is a much better physician.’

‘Because Rougham was present when the malady first afflicted me,’ said Warde apologetically. ‘He offered me his services and that was that. I was stuck with him.’

Warde chatted about how he was looking forward to the forthcoming Disputatio for a few moments, then headed for St Clement’s Church, where he said a special mass was being held to honour a much-loved saint. Bartholomew wanted to know which saint could attract the enormous congregation that was gathering, but Michael was impatient for food, and pulled him down the High Street towards Gonville Hall, where his whole groat’s worth of meat was waiting. They had not gone far when there was a scream and a sudden commotion. Voices were raised and people began to run, converging on bodies that lay scattered in the road.

The first thing Bartholomew saw was Thomas Mortimer, sitting on the ground with his legs splayed in front of him and a startled expression on his face. Of the horses and cart there was no sign, and the physician assumed they had galloped off on their own. The second thing he spotted was the crumpled form of an old man with a broken neck. And the final thing was a fellow named Isnard, who lay in a spreading pool of blood.

‘God damn you to Hell, Thomas Mortimer!’ Isnard roared, trying to reach the bewildered miller and give him a pummelling with his fists. His face registered bemused shock when he found he could not stand, and he grabbed his bleeding leg with both hands. ‘Look what you have done!’

Bartholomew knelt next to the old man, sorry to recognise him as the barber who had shorn him of hair just the previous day. The merest glance told him there was nothing he could do, so Michael eased him out of the way to begin his own ministrations, muttering a final absolution and anointing the body with the phial of chrism he kept for such occasions. Although Michael was a monk, rather than a priest, he had been granted special dispensation to offer last rites during the plague, and had continued the practice since.

Bartholomew turned his attention to Isnard, an uncouth bargeman who sang in Michaelhouse’s choir. He was as tall as the physician but almost as broad as Michael, which made him a formidable opponent in the many brawls he enjoyed in the town’s various taverns. He earned his living on the river, using his massive strength to service the boats that travelled through the Fens to supply Cambridge with grain, stone, wool and other goods. His thin hair was plastered in greasy strands across the top of his head, but this was more than compensated for by the luxuriant brown beard that hung almost to his belt.

‘What happened?’ Bartholomew asked, pushing away Isnard’s hands so he could inspect the wound in his leg. It was a serious one, with splinters of bone protruding through the calf in a mess of gore and torn muscle. Bartholomew knew it could not be mended.

‘I was talking to old Master Lenne when that drunken sot trampled us both into the ground,’ yelled Isnard, outraged. He was not feeling pain, because the shock of the injury was still too recent. But he would, Bartholomew knew, and then the agony would be almost unbearable. One of Bartholomew’s students, a lad called Martyn Quenhyth, was in the crowd that had gathered to watch, so he sent him to fetch a stretcher. Isnard should be carried home before his anguish made him difficult to control.

‘I did not,’ said Mortimer, sobering up quickly as the seriousness of his situation penetrated his pickled wits. ‘I was just moving along and they ran in front of me.’

‘Lies!’ bellowed Isnard. ‘How could Lenne “run” anywhere? He is an old man!’

‘Did anyone actually see what happened?’ asked Michael, watching Bartholomew tie a tight bandage below the bargeman’s knee to stem the bleeding.

‘I did,’ said Bosel the beggar, whose hand had been severed by the King’s justices for persistent stealing, although he claimed its loss was from fighting in the French wars. He was unusually well dressed that morning, because some kind soul had given him new clothes. ‘I saw Thomas Mortimer deliberately aim at Isnard and Lenne and ride them down.’

Bartholomew was sceptical. Bosel was not noted for his devotion to the truth, and might well stand as a witness against one of the wealthy Mortimer clan, just so he could later retract his statement – for a price. He had done as much before.

‘Anyone else?’ asked Michael, looking around at the crowd and apparently thinking along the same lines. Bosel would not make a credible witness.

There were shaken heads all around. ‘But Mortimer is drunk,’ added the taverner of the Brazen George. ‘I know a man out of his senses from ale when I see one.’

‘Not me,’ persisted Mortimer, white-faced and uneasy. ‘There was nothing I could do to avoid them. They just raced in front of my cart.’

‘We did not!’ objected Isnard hotly, wincing when Bartholomew tightened the bandage. ‘See to Lenne, will you, Doctor? I saw the cart hit him, and he needs your help more than I do. I know he gave you that fierce haircut, but you should not hold it against him. He no longer sees very well.’

Bartholomew said nothing, and concentrated on covering Isnard’s exposed leg bones with a piece of clean linen in an attempt to protect the injury from the filth of the street. It was Michael who leaned down and put a comforting hand on the bargeman’s shoulder.

Isnard’s jaw dropped in horror when he understood what their silence meant. ‘Lenne is dead?’ he gasped in disbelief. ‘Mortimer has killed him?’

‘I have killed no one,’ said Mortimer, coming slowly and unsteadily to his feet. No one made any attempt to help him. ‘I am going to be sick.’

The spectators watched in distaste as the miller deposited his ale into the brimming gutters that ran down the High Street. Bending close to the drains’ noxious fumes and unsavoury contents made him more ill than ever, and it was some time before he was able to stand, ashen-faced and trembling. He wiped a sleeve across his mouth, and eyed his audience defiantly.