Susanna GREGORY - An Order for Death

‘What are you doing here?’ Michael asked the Merton man in a soft whisper. ‘A procession of realism-obsessed Carmelites is no place for the country’s leading thinker on nominalism. Are you mad?’

‘No such restrictions apply in Oxford,’ replied Heytesbury testily. ‘And I met Faricius once. I had the greatest respect for him, and wanted to persuade him to study with me at Merton.’

‘I doubt he would have taken a nominalist master,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Have you not heard how the Orders have ranged themselves around this debate? The Carmelites have decided that realism is the ultimate truth.’

‘Why should that make any difference?’ demanded Heytesbury. ‘The great nominalist William of Occam was a student of the equally great realist Duns Scotus. Faricius had an excellent mind, and I would have welcomed the opportunity to help him hone it, no matter what his beliefs.’

Bartholomew gazed at him, and wondered whether Oxford was really so different from her sister university. In his own experience, Oxford scholars were every bit as belligerent and aggressive as those in Cambridge, and just as prepared to prove their academic points with their fists. But given the strength of the feelings the debate seemed to have engendered that Lent, he could not imagine a Cambridge nominalist being willing to train a realist student, who in time might use that training against him and the beliefs he held dear. He wondered whether Heytesbury was a man of integrity who was devoted to scholarship in all its forms, or simply a fool.

The sombre procession passed in silence through the Carmelites’ orchard and into the small plot of land that had been reserved for burials. It was a pleasant place, sheltered by chestnut trees and overlooking the water meadows that stretched away to the small hamlet of Newnham Croft. Several grassy mounds already graced the area, along with a sizeable knoll that Bartholomew knew was where the friary’s plague victims had been laid to rest.

Under a spreading cedar tree was one of the town’s curiosities. In 1290, a man named Humphrey de Lecton had been the first Carmelite to take a doctor’s degree in Cambridge, and later became the first Carmelite to lecture for the University. When he died, he had been buried with some pomp and ceremony, and his grave was marked with an impressive piece of masonry: a disconcertingly realistic coffin with a likeness of Lecton etched into the top, covered by a four-pillared canopy that had once been painted. Wind and rain had stripped it of its colours, but the tomb still dominated the Carmelites’ peaceful burial ground.

A rectangular hole had been prepared for Faricius near Lecton’s monument, with a mound of excavated mud piled to one side. Water had collected in the bottom of the grave, and the coffin landed with a slight splash as it was lowered inside. Rain pattered on the wood and on the bowed heads of those who gathered around as Lincolne said his final words. Bartholomew saw Horneby standing next to his Prior, scrubbing at his eyes with the sleeve of his habit; the expression on his face was a mixture of anger and grief. Lincolne’s peculiar turret of hair had escaped from under his cowl, and rose vertically from his forehead. Droplets of rain caught in it, so that it glittered in the dull light of the gloomy March afternoon.

‘The Dominicans will pay for this,’ Bartholomew heard Horneby mutter.

‘Faricius was a peaceful man who abhorred violence,’ said Brother Timothy gently. ‘He would not have wanted his friends to indulge themselves in a rampage of hatred on his behalf.’

‘He would not have wanted the Dominicans to murder him and then laugh about it,’ snapped Horneby. ‘They are in their friary celebrating what they have done. Look! They have even sent one of their number to observe his funeral and then report the details back to them.’

All eyes followed his accusing finger, and Michael was astonished to find himself the object of their scrutiny.

‘I am not Dominican,’ he said, aggrieved, pushing back his cowl to reveal his face. ‘I am a Benedictine, as well you know.’

‘Oh, it is you, Brother Michael,’ said Lincolne. ‘In this poor light it is difficult to tell Dominicans from Benedictines. Both wear black cloaks.’

‘Rubbish,’ said Michael brusquely. ‘Anyone with the merest glimmer of sense can tell a mendicant from a monastic. I am a monk, not a friar.’

‘One look at his girth should tell you that,’ Bartholomew thought he heard Heytesbury mutter. ‘Only Benedictines grow to such a size.’

‘Have you come to tell us that you have arrested Faricius’s killer?’ asked Lincolne, in a tone of voice that suggested he did not think they had. ‘It would be a fitting tribute at his funeral.’

‘I have come to ask more questions,’ said Michael. ‘But I am a good deal wiser about this case now than I was yesterday. The truth will prevail, have no doubt about that.’

Bartholomew hoped the monk’s confidence would not turn out to be a hollow brag. As far as he could see, they were even further from an answer, because all they had learned indicated that there was more to Faricius’s death than they had first thought.

Lincolne did not look as if he believed it, either. He turned to the watching mourners with a few words of dismissal. ‘Thank you for coming. It is gratifying to see that a Carmelite commanded such respect among so many people.’

The mourners began to move away in respectful silence. Heytesbury and Janius went with them, so that soon only Lincolne, Bartholomew, Michael and Timothy remained under the cedar tree. Horneby and several of his friends worked nearby, shovelling sodden earth that landed with hollow thumps on top of Faricius’s coffin. Horneby’s face was wet, although from the rain or from bitter tears, Bartholomew could not tell.

‘The proctors have more questions to ask!’ the student-friar jeered, shovelling hard at the earth. ‘There have been more than enough of those already. What we want now are answers.’

‘I would not need to ask more questions if you had told the truth,’ snapped Michael, rounding on him. ‘How can you expect me to catch your friend’s killer when you were dishonest with me?’

‘I was not–’ began Horneby, startled by the attack.

‘You told me it was impossible for Faricius to have left the friary, and yet he was found dead outside,’ Michael continued relentlessly.

‘I only said–’ attempted Horneby.

Michael cut through his words. ‘You are a fool, Horneby. I will find out what happened to Faricius, and I will discover how and why he happened to be outside when the rest of you were in here. But, by not telling me the truth, you are running the risk that the culprit may have fled the town before I uncover him. Is that what you want?’

‘No! Of course not. But–’

‘Then tell me what you know,’ said Michael, in full interrogatory mode. Even Bartholomew felt intimidated by the flashing green eyes and the unwavering gaze. A mere novice like Horneby was helpless under the monk’s onslaught.

‘Nothing,’ stammered Horneby, casting an agonised glance at Lincolne that would have told even the most inexperienced investigator that he was lying.

‘Why was Faricius out?’ repeated Michael. He appealed to Lincolne. ‘Are we to stand here all day waiting for this half-wit to speak? Instruct him to answer me immediately, before any more time is wasted on his petty deceits.’

‘You had better tell him what you know, Horneby,’ said Lincolne tiredly.

‘But we decided to keep it a secret,’ wailed Horneby miserably, looking at his fellows, who seemed as unhappy as he did.

‘What are you talking about?’ asked Lincolne, bemused. ‘Keep what a secret?’