Susanna GREGORY - An Order for Death

‘Very wise of you,’ said Michael, as Ringstead reluctantly told the students to return to their rooms. ‘Nothing would have been gained from a display of violent behaviour, and it would have looked bad for when you try to prove your Prior’s innocence in the courts.’

‘But he is innocent,’ protested Ringstead, following them to the gate. He watched Morden precede Timothy on to Hadstock Way and head in the direction of the cells that were located near St Mary’s Church. Timothy was not an unkind man, and Bartholomew saw him bend to say something to which the small Prior nodded agreement. Timothy released Morden’s arm, and although he stayed close and was clearly alert for tricks, he did not submit Morden to the indignity of being marched through the busiest part of the town in the grip of a proctor. To anyone who did not know what had just transpired in the Dominican Friary, Morden and Timothy were simply walking side by side.

While Bartholomew approved of Timothy’s sensitivity, Michael muttered venomously that Morden deserved no such consideration, and started to compare his new junior unfavourably with Walcote, who was similarly kind to malefactors. Ringstead broke into his mumbled tirade.

‘How can you think Morden could stab students? He is not big enough.’

‘Arbury was knifed in the chest,’ said Michael. ‘Morden could easily have done it.’

‘That is no kind of evidence,’ objected Ringstead, almost in tears that he was so powerless. ‘And neither is that wretched glove. Lots of things seem to have gone missing from our friary recently – the glove was just one of a number of items we seem to have mislaid.’

‘What else?’ asked Michael, uninterested.

‘Perhaps the most important thing is Kyrkeby’s lecture,’ replied Ringstead. ‘When we learned about his death, we decided his work should not have been in vain, and we were going to publish it posthumously. But we cannot find it.’

‘Perhaps he hid it,’ suggested Bartholomew. ‘Some people do not like their work known before their public lectures, and he may have put it away from prying eyes.’

‘Never,’ said Ringstead firmly. ‘We have no need to hide things from each other here, and anyway, he read parts of the lecture to several of us to test his performance. He did not hide his notes. I went to collect them from his cell, and they simply were not there.’

‘Then are you suggesting that someone took them?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘Or that Kyrkeby merely mislaid them?’

‘A few moments ago, I would have said the latter,’ said Ringstead. ‘But given that poor Morden is now under arrest because a missing glove has appeared somewhere I am sure he did not leave it, then I suggest that they must have been stolen.’

‘So, you wish to report a theft,’ said Michael heavily.

‘Yes I do,’ snapped Ringstead, resentful that Michael clearly did not believe him.

‘You have no evidence the lecture has been stolen,’ said Michael, exasperated by Ringstead’s heavy-handed attempts to exonerate his leader. ‘You only know that it is not in Kyrkeby’s cell. Perhaps he gave it to someone else to read; perhaps he put it in a different place.’

‘But he did not have another place!’ insisted Ringstead. ‘His life was here, at the friary.’ He sighed and relented a little. ‘But I suppose he may have given it to someone else to read. I know he discussed it with Father Paul at the Franciscan Friary. Perhaps he passed it to Paul.’

‘Why would he do that?’ asked Michael doubtfully. ‘Paul is blind. He cannot read anything.’

Ringstead flushed with embarrassment. ‘Well, in that case, my first supposition must be right: Kyrkeby’s lecture has been stolen.’

‘What a mess,’ said Michael tiredly. ‘Still, at least we have the killer of poor Arbury under lock and key. And who knows? Perhaps Morden may confess to other crimes once he has had time to reflect on his evil deeds through the bars on his cell window. We shall see.’

Bartholomew hoped he was right and gave Ringstead a wide berth as he left the friary. It was certainly not the tiny Morden with whom he had struggled at Michaelhouse, and he realised that the young secretary could well be Morden’s accomplice.

While Timothy locked Morden in a cell, Bartholomew and Michael walked slowly along the High Street, thinking about Morden’s claims of innocence and Ringstead’s assertion that someone had been in the Dominican Friary stealing gloves and lectures on nominalism. The day was wet and dull, and clouds hung in a solid canopy over the Fen-edge town. There was no wind, and the bare branches of trees and bushes were static and skeletal, while the leaves that had fallen the previous autumn lay in brown-black soggy piles filled with worms. The market was in full swing, and the hoarse voices of competing traders rang out in the still air, accompanied by the mournful bellow of a cow that was being led towards the butchers’ stalls. Bartholomew saw its rolling eyes and quivering flanks, and wondered if it knew what was in store for it, or whether it was simply the stench of rotting blood and the sound of metal against bone as the butchers dealt with a sheep that it did not like.

Michael led the physician towards an insalubrious establishment at the edge of the Market Square called the Cardinal’s Cap. A joyous red sign hung outside, and from within came the contented murmur of men enjoying their ale. Michael did not use the front entrance, but slipped down a filthy runnel that cut along the side of the building, and entered a much smaller room via an almost invisible rear door.

Inside, a number of scholars were sitting at rough wooden tables; some were gathered around a fire that roared in the hearth, listening to a dialogue by a man Bartholomew knew to be Father Aidan of Maude’s Hostel. None seemed in the slightest disconcerted by the sudden presence of the Senior Proctor in their midst, and one or two even nodded friendly greetings in Michael’s direction.

‘I need a pot of warm ale inside me before we walk to St Radegund’s in this rain,’ said Michael. ‘And perhaps a bowl of beef stew.’

‘Not beef,’ said Bartholomew, thinking about the cow he had just seen led to slaughter. He thought he could still hear its baleful lows echoing across the Market Square. ‘It is Lent, remember. But what is this place? A room in a tavern devoted exclusively to serving scholars?’

‘Have you never been here before?’ asked Michael, raising his eyebrows in astonishment. ‘I thought every University master knew that the Cardinal’s Cap was a good place for a quiet drink. Students are not welcome here, of course. They would be rowdy, and then we would all be in trouble.’

‘Scholars are not supposed to drink in the town’s taverns,’ said Bartholomew. ‘It is what leads to fighting between us and the townsfolk.’

Michael gestured to the conversations that were taking place around him. In one corner, a number of Gilbertines were discussing the sermons of St Augustine, while Father Aidan’s audience appeared to be listening to an explanation of how to deal with the problem of dry rot. At other tables, single scholars read or wrote with their cups at their elbows, enjoying the comfort of hot ale and a warm fire while they worked.

‘These men are unlikely to challenge the apprentices to a fight,’ said Michael. ‘They are all respectable people, who like a little intelligent conversation away from their own Colleges and hostels. Where lies the harm in that?’

Michael had arranged for Timothy to meet them in the Cardinal’s Cap when he had finished locking up Morden. The Benedictine arrived and sat opposite them, ordering bread and cheese, and if he noticed that Michael was breaking the rules of Lent by eating meat, then he said nothing about it.