Susanna GREGORY - A Summer of Discontent

‘Not him,’ said Roger firmly. ‘We gave him plenty of time to try, but he was irredeemable. Even you said as much. Julian was too firmly entrenched in his own wickedness to change.’

‘Was that the criterion Henry used to select his victims?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘That they were people he did not like?’

‘People who were selfish and rotten,’ corrected Roger. ‘People without whom the world is a better place. Just look around you. Pilgrims are thronging joyfully to pray to St Etheldreda now that Robert is not here to make them pay; my old friends in this hall are sleeping with full bellies, because Thomas has not stolen their food; and no one will deny that the library will fare better without Symon. The same goes for those townsmen – Glovere, Chaloner and Haywarde.’

‘We should find Henry before he does any more harm,’ said Michael heavily, standing up. It was not a task he anticipated with relish. ‘Where is he?’

‘I will not tell you,’ said Roger, folding his arms and eyeing them defiantly. ‘If you find him, you will have him hanged or imprisoned for the rest of his life. He does not deserve that, after bringing so much happiness to the world.’

‘He did not bring much happiness to Guido,’ said Bartholomew dryly.

‘Cynric told me that Guido was poisoned,’ said Roger. ‘Henry and I guessed it was with the wine that was intended for Michael. But it does not matter. It will not take the clan long to realise that they are better without him, too. He was a killer himself.’

‘Guido did strike William a fatal blow,’ acknowledged Bartholomew. ‘William was on his way to fetch another investigator, although I doubt he would have survived the journey. According to Guido’s testimony, it sounds as though the poison was already working.’

‘Why did William suddenly decide to fetch another investigator?’ asked Michael. ‘Did he discover something that made him realise that the case was more than I could handle?’

‘William came here to tell Henry that he trusted none of the three official investigators to uncover the truth,’ replied Roger. ‘He wanted someone to know where he was going, you see, should he be missed. I slipped something from Henry’s workshop into the wine he drank before he left.’

‘ You poisoned him?’ asked Bartholomew, startled. ‘I thought Henry had done it.’

‘Henry prefers more compassionate methods of execution,’ said Roger matter-of-factly. ‘Poisons can be nasty.’

‘A knife in the neck might be painful,’ said Bartholomew. ‘It would render the victim immobile, but he would know exactly what was happening to him. Henry’s victims died in terror.’

‘Thomas did not,’ said Roger. ‘Unfortunately.’

‘Do not tell me that was you, too?’ asked Bartholomew, horrified.

‘It was,’ said Roger with pride. ‘I knew from Henry how it was done, and it was not difficult when the man was just lying there, so still and so silent. I did it while Henry slept so deeply that he drooled on his table – a small detail that did not escape Alan’s attention, I remember.’

‘So, there was no cloaked intruder wandering through the infirmary and praying as he went?’ asked Michael.

Roger gave a wicked grin. ‘You see how willing you were to believe a tale that made me look like some feeble halfwit? It never once occurred to you that if a killer really had entered my home, I would recall every detail about him.’

‘That is because I did not think you would lie to me,’ said Michael stiffly. ‘You are offended now, because you think I imagine you to be some drooling ancient who can barely see. But you would have been even more offended if I had claimed I believed nothing you said.’

‘So, Henry’s shock at discovering that Thomas was murdered was quite genuine,’ mused Bartholomew. ‘He was right: Thomas probably would not have died if Henry had not slept.’

‘Henry was distressed,’ agreed Roger carelessly. ‘He had hopes that Thomas’s illness might make him repent of his wicked ways and render him a more pleasant person. Personally, I thought Thomas beyond that kind of salvation, and so I decided to remove him from this world while the opportunity was there.’

Michael shot Bartholomew a triumphant glance. ‘You see? I told you Henry would not have killed a patient.’

‘But he killed everyone else,’ said Bartholomew.

‘It is no more than they deserved,’ said Roger, unmoved.

‘And he intended to have me die from poison,’ said Michael bitterly.

‘True,’ admitted Roger. ‘But that was because the vigour of your investigation was unsettling him. He could not dose you with hemp like Northburgh and Stretton, because Bartholomew would have noticed. Poor Henry was at a loss to know what to do about you.’

‘You admit Henry drugged the official investigators?’ asked Michael, disapprovingly.

Roger shrugged. ‘It has done them no harm. Indeed, it has made that miserable Northburgh much more amiable company.’

‘William stole ten marks from the priory,’ said Michael, abruptly changing the subject. It was disconcerting to hear his death discussed in such dispassionate terms, especially since Henry was involved. ‘We found it in the granary. What do you know about that?’

‘William did not steal that money. Robert lied to him, saying he did not have enough alms for the poor, so William drew on the hosteller’s fund to help him. Robert, however, merely hid the coins away for himself.’

‘That does not sound like William,’ said Michael doubtfully. ‘Why should he give his own funds to help the almoner – especially when that almoner was a man he despised?’

‘Because William was not wholly wicked, like Robert,’ said Roger impatiently. ‘He was cunning and sly, but he did not allow the poor to go hungry. He genuinely believed that Robert really had run out of funds, but became suspicious later. That was why he watched Robert so closely all the time.’

‘We found him searching the almonry once,’ said Bartholomew, recalling that the hosteller had hidden behind a tapestry in Robert’s domain so that he could search it for evidence that the almoner had been lining his own pockets.

‘Henry caught Robert in the vineyards,’ Roger went on, eyes gleaming, as though he was proud of what had happened. ‘The man was not going to look for William, as Alan had ordered him to do, but was taking the opportunity to gloat over the hoard he had secreted in the granary. Henry said you found it and returned it to the priory coffers, so that ended well.’

‘But why did Henry kill Robert?’ asked Michael, rather plaintively. ‘Or rather, since we already know why, why then? Why not later? Why did Henry take the considerable risk of slaying Robert in broad daylight and dumping his corpse in a very public place?’

‘Because Robert was asking too many questions, and Henry had the impression that he was forming his own suspicions as regards the identity of the killer. It was simply not worth the risk. I told Henry to dispatch him as soon as the opportunity arose. And it did – when that reprobate went to the granary to pore over his ill-gotten gains.’

‘So, Robert was killed for his greed,’ mused Bartholomew softly. ‘If he had not gone to a remote place to count his gold, then Henry could not have killed him. Well, not then at least.’

‘What underhand business was Thomas involved in?’ demanded Michael of Roger. ‘We saw him in the vineyards and a package changed hands. What was that about?’

Roger smiled. ‘You are right. Thomas was involved in underhand business. That lovely book of hours belongs to our library, as I would have told you, had you bothered to ask an old man. It is one of our most valuable possessions. Robert stole it, and that incompetent Symon did not notice it was missing. Robert gave it to Thomas in return for turning a blind eye to inconsistencies in the almonry accounts, which, as sub-prior, Thomas was obliged to check.’