The scholars returned to the Half Moon that evening tired and dispirited. As he undressed for bed, questions tumbled around in Bartholomew’s exhausted mind. Who would want to kill Unwin? Was the culprit Grosnold, seen talking to him ‘surreptitiously’ by Eltisley after the feast and by Bartholomew in the castle bailey at Otley? Or was it the mysterious figure seen running from the church by Stoate the physician? What might the pardoner know about a relic that might have been offered for sale in the last day or so? And what of the white dog, which had so many of the villagers terrified out of their wits?
Chapter 6
Before daybreak the following morning, Bartholomew and Michael were waiting on the path that led from the village to the fields, hoping to speak to the people who were away from the village each day from dawn to dusk working the land. As the sky began to lighten, men, women and even children trudged wearily towards them, hoes and spades over their shoulders, their footsteps slow and unwilling. Although all seemed well-fed and healthy enough, it was a hard and dull life, and most were delighted to stop and talk to the Michaelhouse scholars, to break the monotony of toiling among Tuddenham’s ripening crops.
Many seemed to be exhausted before they even started, and yawned and stretched as they answered Michael’s patient questions. Bartholomew wondered whether the celebrations for the Pentecost Fair had extended longer than Tuddenham knew.
No one had anything of value to add regarding Unwin’s death. Most had spotted him at the Fair – they had been interested to see him because he was to have been their priest – but none had noticed him enter the church, or observed him speaking to anyone in particular before he died. They seemed genuinely appalled that a friar had been murdered in their village, but all declared that it was only to be expected once Unwin had set eyes on Padfoot. Michael tried in vain to convince them that Unwin had seen only a stray dog, but, although they listened politely, it was obvious they did not concur.
By noon, Michael and Bartholomew had spoken to dozens of people, but had learned nothing. Disgusted, Michael led the way back to Grundisburgh to interview the pardoner, leaving the neat strips of yellow and their dusty guardians behind. The village was peaceful. Those not in the fields were tending the sheep on the hills or minding the cows that grazed on the common land near the church. Two children laughed as they shepherded a flock of white geese along The Street, and somewhere a baby cried as a mother tried to sing it to sleep. Smoke seeped through the roofs of one or two huts where those too old or too ill to work had been left to do the cooking, but most homes were still and silent, and would be so until their owners returned after sunset that day.
As they passed the Dog tavern they saw Hamon inside, drinking deeply from a huge jug. He spotted them through the window and beckoned them over, wiping his lips on his sleeve as he set the empty vessel on the table.
‘I spoke with the Sheriffs deputy this morning,’ he said without preamble. ‘He said he was happy that my uncle is doing all in his power to trace Unwin’s killer, and has placed the matter officially in his hands.’
‘You mean the deputy has been and gone?’ asked Michael in horror. ‘He did not even bother to pay his respects to me – the Bishop’s agent and his representative in canon law?’
‘You only represent the Bishop of Ely. This is the See of the Bishop of Norwich so, as far as the Sheriff is concerned, you have no authority here. We do not think that, of course,’ Hamon added quickly, when he saw the monk’s face darken.
Bartholomew was disgusted. ‘So the Sheriff does not care that a priest has been murdered in his shire?’
Hamon shrugged. ‘He is a busy man, and is more concerned with catching the outlaws who operate along the Old Road, than in wasting valuable time in duplicating the work my uncle is doing.’
‘Investigating the murder of a priest is a waste of no one’s time,’ snapped Michael. He sat next to Hamon. ‘This has made me quite weak at the knees. Landlord! Bring the some wine. And perhaps also a chicken, if you have one to hand.’
Hamon grinned, openly amused by Michael’s transparent greed, and then stood. ‘I must go. Since the Death, the village has been desperately short of labourers, and I have been forced to hire those sullen men who are staying at the Half Moon. If I do not supervise them constantly, they do not work.’
‘They sound like my students,’ muttered Michael. He nodded with approval as the food arrived, and Bartholomew sat next to him, tired after the long, fruitless morning.
‘Damn that Sheriff!’ said Michael, as he tore a leg from a chicken. ‘Dick Tulyet would never delegate the murder of a friar to some local landowner. It is not right!’
‘I do not like it,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Tuddenham is now under considerable obligation to solve Unwin’s murder. I hope he does not manipulate the truth, and end up with a scapegoat rather than the real culprit.’
Michael sighed. ‘You are far too suspicious and untrusting these days. You were not like this five years ago. Even I accept that people occasionally tell the truth and have motives that are honourable. But we should hurry. I want to catch that pardoner before he slinks off to ply his foul trade in Ipswich again.’
On their way to Norys’s house, Bartholomew and Michael passed the latrine, where Eltisley the landlord was engaged in something that entailed a good deal of muttering and the frenzied use of heavy tools. The latrine was a splendid affair – as such structures went – and Eltisley had spent some time over dinner the previous evening explaining how he had built it, announcing proudly that it served most of the village. It comprised a low shed built over a trench that, as far as Bartholomew could tell, then drained straight through the soil into the river at precisely the point where most people collected their drinking water. It had three stalls, each with a separate door to ensure privacy – a feature seldom seen outside monasteries or palaces.
Eltisley had a hefty awl in his hand, and was busily hacking a hole the size of a plum in one of the doors, muttering to himself as he did so.
‘What is he doing?’ asked Michael curiously, pausing to look.
‘Do not ask,’ said Bartholomew, taking his arm and trying to walk past the landlord without becoming engaged in a lengthy conversation. ‘As I have already told you, I do not think Eltisley is quite in control of his faculties. And that is my professional medical opinion.’
‘He is probably going to sit there and look for that ghostly dog of yours through the hole he is making,’ said Michael with an unpleasant snigger.
‘What do you think of this?’ called Eltisley, just as Bartholomew thought they had escaped. ‘Come and see.’
‘Oh, Lord!’ groaned Bartholomew. ‘Now we shall be here all day listening to some peculiar theory about latrine architecture.’
‘You do not like him very much, do you?’ said Michael, as they walked towards Eltisley.
‘I do not like him at all,’ said Bartholomew. ‘He is dangerous. He told me last night he has a cure for palsies that involves drowning a patient, and then reviving him. He is planning to try it on some poor child in Otley. I told Stoate about it, and hope to God he manages to intervene in time.’
‘No physician likes a patient who knows more medicine than he does,’ observed Michael complacently, beaming at the landlord as they reached the latrines.
Bartholomew ignored him, and looked to where Eltisley was gesturing with barely concealed excitement. For some reason he had chopped holes in each of the three doors, and was waving some kind of device at them with evident pride.
‘It is a latch I have designed myself,’ he said enthusiastically. ‘It will mean that the door can be locked from the inside and, as the bar drops, its weight will turn a mechanism so that the metal facing the outside will turn to this part that has been painted red.’