Susanna Gregory: A Wicked Deed

‘But it was not the first time you had spoken secretly to Unwin,’ said Bartholomew. ‘You met him before we ever arrived in Grundisburgh. I saw you talking to him in your bailey.’

‘True,’ said Grosnold. ‘I asked for his blessing because I had been hunting on a feast day, and needed absolution. He gave it to me.’

So that was it, thought Bartholomew, recalling the student emerging from Grosnold’s bailey that night. And because Grosnold had made a confession, Unwin could not break his silence to tell Bartholomew what had transpired. It was all purely innocent after all.

‘I know you suspected me of ambushing you here after you did my astrological consultation,’ Grosnold continued. ‘You thought I wanted to ensure your silence regarding the deed you found about who gave me my manor …’

‘What deed is this?’ asked Hamon, interested.

‘A deed that is none of your affair,’ said Tuddenham softly. He exchanged a look with Grosnold that told Bartholomew that it was a secret that he had known for many years, and that it would be a secret kept.

‘… or that I had something to hide regarding Unwin’s death,’ Grosnold finished.

‘Well, you did,’ said Bartholomew. ‘You denied meeting him, and confused us with lies.’

‘But not with malicious intent,’ said Tuddenham defensively. ‘Grosnold sought only to protect me.’ He smiled at his neighbour. ‘And if Alcote had possessed a friend half as loyal he might be here now, not lying in his coffin in the church.’

‘Just a moment,’ began Michael indignantly. ‘We have-’

Tuddenham held up a hand. ‘You did not like him, Brother. None of you did. You did not grieve for him, as that nice young Horsey did for Unwin. You were angry and indignant at his murder, but none of you will miss him much.’

‘Do you really think he is dead?’ asked Bartholomew, remembering the fussy little scholar. ‘I keep expecting him to walk up to us, and announce that there has been some dreadful mistake.’

‘Yes, it would not surprise me to learn that he had persuaded some other unfortunate to take his place in Eltisley’s inferno,’ said Michael. ‘It would be the kind of thing he would do.’

‘Or perhaps he did die, but his angry spirit will not let his body rest,’ whispered Hamon, looking at the forlorn hovels of the deserted village. ‘Perhaps he will join the plague-dead here, in Barchester, and wander through the houses wailing and gnashing his teeth.’

It was not a pleasant image, and Bartholomew found himself glancing behind him, in the direction in which Hamon was gazing so fearfully. He pulled himself together irritably, refusing to be drawn into yet more superstitious tales and pagan beliefs. Padfoot, which had held the village in such terror, was nothing but a toothless performing bear, and the happenings at Barchester were sinister enough, but there was nothing supernatural about them.

‘Alcote’s time had come, and he was called,’ said William in the tone of voice he usually reserved for preaching to people he considered heretics. ‘Although called by whom, I should not like to guess.’

‘It is the will of God that he is gone,’ said Wauncy. His eyes, glittering in his skull-like face, took on a predatory gleam. ‘But if you are genuinely concerned for the state of his soul, you might consider making a donation for a few masses to reduce his time in Purgatory. Unfortunately, owing to the sudden increase in demand for my services, I have been forced to raise my prices: sixpence a mass.’

‘God’s blood!’ spat Michael, outraged. ‘Your taverner murders our colleagues, and you charge us extra for requiem masses?’

‘Master Wauncy will say a mass free of charge every day for a month, for Master Alcote and for Unwin,’ said Tuddenham, ignoring the gasp of fiscal indignation from his cadaverous priest. ‘I am sorry for all the wrong that has been perpetrated against Michaelhouse on my manor, and will make amends. I not only propose to give the living of the church to your College, but will build the new vicar — the replacement sent for Unwin — a fine new house. If you are still willing to accept the advowson, that is.’

‘We are,’ said Michael, before anyone could decline. ‘It is what Alcote would have wanted.’

Bartholomew looked at the forlorn row of corpses that lay in the long grass, his gaze lingering on Eltisley’s green apron. ‘Well, at least now poor Alcote is avenged.’

Michael shivered suddenly as a chill breeze hissed through the dead village and made the flames on the burning church dance and flicker. ‘Then let us hope he is also at rest,’ he whispered.

Cambridge, June 1353

The sun slanted golden and soft through the branches of the fruit trees in the orchard at the back of Michaelhouse where Bartholomew and Michael sat side by side on the trunk of an old apple tree that had fallen many years before. The air was still and warm, and was full of the familiar aromas of the town: the sweet scent of flowers, the rich smell of cut grass and the sulphurous stench of the river and its myriad of ditches that crisscrossed the countryside.

‘So, it is done,’ said Michael in satisfaction, stretching his legs out in front of him, and folding his hands across his stomach. ‘Today, in Cambridge, the deed granting Michaelhouse the living of the Church of Our Lady in Grundisburgh was formally signed by Walter Wauncy on behalf of Thomas Tuddenham, in front of the Chancellor of the University and the Master and Fellows of the College.’

‘But at what cost?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘It brought about terrible suffering, and led to so much evil being done.’

‘Yes,’ said Michael. He gave a sudden grin. ‘I suppose it was what you might call a wicked deed. But Michaelhouse gained from it. It has all been worthwhile.’

‘Roger Alcote would not agree,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Nor would Unwin. Not to mention Will Norys, the Freemans, Alice Quy, Roland Deblunville, Dame Eva, Isilia, Tobias Eltisley and Eltisley’s men.’

‘But some good has come of this,’ protested Michael mildly. ‘Horsey is now parish priest of Grundisburgh, and we will never need to concern ourselves about his welfare again. And he will make a much better parish priest than Unwin ever would have done.’

‘Why did he volunteer to do that, do you think?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘The rest of us were only too keen to leave Suffolk and return to Cambridge.’

‘I think his few days in the leper hospital with Deynman may have swayed him. There is always the possibility in the Franciscan Order that he might be sent to work in one, and I think he thought a job as a priest in a pretty rural village like Grundisburgh was far preferable. He will be well paid — especially with all those masses for the dead to say — and relatively safe from diseases.’

Bartholomew did not reply. He had been concerned when there had been no sign of Deynman and Horsey at Brother Peter’s leper hospital, and had spent some days traipsing across the county with Cynric searching for them. They were finally unearthed at a leper hospital in Ipswich. Somehow — although Bartholomew could not imagine how, given that the Old Road was almost completely straight — Deynman had managed to lose his way. Unconcerned, he had merely made the decision that one leper hospital was very much like another, selected a suitable institution in Ipswich, and settled in comfortably to wait for Bartholomew to collect him.

Unlike Horsey, who had apparently had doubts about the venture from the very beginning, Deynman had not been in the least surprised when Bartholomew eventually tracked them down, although his teacher’s exasperation had clearly puzzled him. But it had been one of the few times when Deynman’s inability to complete even the most basic of tasks had worked to his advantage.