‘So is Julianna,’ Matilde pointed out. ‘I imagine they would be rather well suited.’
‘But you said she was betrothed to Edward Mortimer,’ said Michael, ‘so there can be no future in her yearnings for our loutish philosopher.’
‘Yearnings are not so easily cast aside,’ said Matilde. ‘Especially when one is young.’
‘Why does she not like Edward?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘He seems comely enough to me.’
‘But you are not a young woman of twenty-two, Matthew,’ said Matilde. ‘Edward is three years younger than Julianna, and probably seems like a baby to her. Given the choice, I would take Ralph de Langelee over Edward: Edward has not seen enough of the world to make him interesting, and he had been too long under the thumb of his father. Julianna doubtless wants to cast her net wider.’
Did Matilde know Edward and Langelee so well? Bartholomew wondered, regarding her with renewed curiosity. Matilde’s customers were a subject that, by mutual consent, they did not discuss. He doubted she would have told him even if he asked. Not for the first time in their friendship, he found himself wishing she had chosen another profession, and that she was someone he might ask to walk with him in the meadows by the river, or take to the mystery plays in St Mary’s Church.
The last time he had invited her to spend some time with him, she had felt obliged to disguise herself as an old woman to protect both their reputations. Despite the fact that they had laughed about it since, Bartholomew regretted that he had been unable to enjoy her company without her resorting to subterfuge and heavy cosmetics. He wondered what his sister would say if he took Matilde to Trumpington, so that they might see the early-born lambs together, or she might sit with him in the kitchen stealing hot cakes from the griddle.
Reluctantly, he forced his thoughts away from Matilde, and began to consider Julianna. She was evidently not all she seemed. Could she be involved in the smuggling, perhaps escaping from Denny to warn her uncle that Dame Pelagia had incriminating evidence against him? Deschalers claimed he had discovered a way of storing lemons in his cellars that kept them fresh. But what if he were lying, and his lemons came from the illicit trading routes through the Fens, as Stanmore believed?
‘Deschalers might have made a worse match for Julianna than Edward,’ he said, standing and placing his unfinished wine on the table. ‘Old Master Cheney has been looking for a young wife ever since his own died during the plague. Julianna is lucky her uncle does not press Cheney on her.’
‘But Cheney knows about her past,’ said Matilde, rising to see him to the door. ‘Julianna was sent to Denny because Langelee was just one in a line of alliances completed within a matter of weeks that impresses even me.’
Bartholomew supposed he should not be surprised to hear that Julianna had made the most of her time in Cambridge, and realised that Michael had been right – living in Michaelhouse was blinding him to the ways of the world. He smiled at Matilde and thanked her for her hospitality. Michael glanced at his grandmother, who appeared to be asleep, and made no move to leave.
‘Your grandmother has a habit of pretending to doze when she is fully awake,’ said Bartholomew tartly, reluctant to leave the fat monk alone with Matilde. ‘I would not tarry here if I were you, Brother.’
Michael sighed, and levered his massive bulk from Matilde’s best chair to follow Bartholomew out into the street. As Matilde stood on the doorstep to bid them farewell, Bartholomew saw Dame Pelagia snap awake and reach for the wine he had left in his cup.
‘Thank you for looking after my grandmother,’ said Michael. ‘You will find she will be no trouble, and will know when to make herself scarce.’
Matilde looked through the half-open door at the old lady, who had drained the remains of Bartholomew’s wine, and was now looking to see if the other cups were empty. ‘I will enjoy the company,’ she said, smiling. ‘I have a feeling she has a great many fascinating stories to help pass the long winter evenings.’
Bartholomew, watching the old lady settle herself comfortably by the fire with a cup in either hand, was sure she had.
The rest of the day was spent at Michaelhouse, teaching in the chilly hall. Great grey clouds that threatened more rain had rolled in, and the room was dark and gloomy. In one corner, a student of Alcote’s strained his eyes to read Cicero’s Rhetoric in a flat monotone to a group of first years, while Alcote himself was relaxing by the fire in his own sumptuous quarters, having declined to grace the dismal hall with his presence. In another corner, Father William ranted about the Devil being in unexpected places to his little band of similarly fanatical Franciscans in a voice sufficiently loud to be heard in the High Street. At regular intervals, the other Fellows asked him to moderate the volume so that they could concentrate on their own teaching, his rabid diatribes distracting even the tolerant Master Kenyngham.
In front of the empty hearth, Ralph de Langelee strutted back and forth, waving his meaty arms around as he expounded Aristotle to three bemused students who would fail their degrees if they repeated his peculiar logic in their disputations. John Runham was giving a lecture on the Corpus juris civilis in the conclave, a smaller and far more pleasant room at the far end of the hall, but since he had at least fifteen students hanging on his every word, there was no space for any of the other Fellows to share it with him. Bartholomew was not the only one who resented being excluded from the conclave: it was the only room in Michaelhouse with glass in the windows, and therefore was by far the warmest place in the College and easily the most popular spot after the kitchen.
Like Alcote’s students, Michael’s Benedictines were obliged to manage without him – he was with Vice-Chancellor Harling at St Mary’s Church discussing the ambush and composing a message to inform the Bishop of what had happened – and they sat quietly in the middle of the room analysing one of St Augustine’s Sermons in low voices, although occasional laughter and a good deal of grinning made Bartholomew suspect their conversation had wandered somewhat from the original topic. Bartholomew’s own students sat in two lines on wall benches under the unglazed windows, shivering in the draught and wrapped in an odd assortment of cloaks and blankets.
Michaelhouse Fellows had a choice as far as teaching in the hall was concerned: they could close the shutters and sit in the dark, or they could open the shutters and have daylight – along with the full force of the elements that blasted in through the glassless tracery. Since reading was difficult in the dark – and Michaelhouse finances did not stretch to providing candles during the night, let alone in the daylight hours – wintertime lectures were usually given to rows of pinched, frozen faces poking out from improbable collections of bed covers, extra clothes and even rugs.
The disputations for students of medicine had been scheduled for the next afternoon and, feeling a huge sense of urgency that his class should succeed, given the chronic shortage of qualified physicians since the plague, Bartholomew grilled the would-be healers relentlessly, firing questions in rapid succession that had them reeling.
When the bell rang to announce the end of the morning’s teaching, so that the hall could be cleared and made ready for the midday meal, the students heaved sighs of relief, and escaped from their demanding master as quickly as they could. Bartholomew, however, was worried. While not even in his wildest dreams did he imagine Deynman would be successful, he had expected Bulbeck, Gray and the others to do well, and was perturbed that their answers to his questions were hesitant and incomplete.
While the Bible Scholar stumbled his way through some incomprehensible genealogy from the Old Testament as they ate, Bartholomew toyed listlessly with his boiled barley and soggy cabbage, his appetite waning further still when he discovered a well-cooked slug among the greens. The more he thought about it, the more he resented losing two valuable days to the ambush in the Fens when he should have been concentrating on his work.