He slapped a dish down with such vigour that it broke in two, sending gravy dribbling through the cracks in the table into Michael’s lap. The monk gave him a withering look, and began to dab it off.
‘I will fetch you another dish,’ said Eltisley, not sounding particularly repentant. ‘Although it will take me a while to prepare. You can change while I cook it.’
‘Perhaps we will dine at the Dog,’ said Michael, peering resentfully at the stain in his lap as Eltisley left. ‘I prefer my food to make its way to my stomach by going through my mouth first, not my habit, and I have had enough of Eltisley’s peculiarities for one day. I am always afraid he will bring me fried earwigs, or a plate of grass, just to see what would happen if I ate them.’
He left before Eltisley could return, beckoning Bartholomew to follow. The monk set an uncharacteristically rapid pace up The Street, a clear indication that Eltisley’s clumsiness had needled him. Since it was raining, they found a table inside the Dog near the roaring fire, where Michael continued to swab at the gravy stains on his habit. The landlord brought them a spiced leek and onion tart, and a stew of pigeon cooked in garlic, with hunks of coarse-grained bread to soak up the sauce. Contemptuously, Michael thrust the tart at Bartholomew, and took the stew for himself, using the bread to scrape off a few offending carrots that had the audacity to adhere to the meat.
‘Eltisley should not be permitted to run a tavern,’ he muttered. ‘I would order him to clean my habit, but I am afraid it might come back grey, because he has used some stain-removing concoction of his own invention. And then I might be mistaken for a Franciscan.’ He shuddered dramatically.
Bartholomew smiled. ‘I do not think so, Brother. You are far too fat to be anything but a Benedictine.’
Michael thrust a large piece of bread into his mouth, gagging slightly on the crumbs. ‘Do not witter, Matt. Tell me again about your foray to Barchester last night.’
‘It seems to me that some old madwoman has taken it for her home, and she and her dog do not like visitors,’ said Bartholomew, rubbing his eyes.
‘Tuddenham will drive her out.’
‘I hope not,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Where would she go? The village is deserted anyway, so why not let her live there if she likes.’
‘Because she ambushes travellers,’ said Michael promptly. ‘She has attacked you twice now, and her dog has people from miles around too terrified to go anywhere near the place.’
‘Not from what I saw last night,’ said Bartholomew. ‘I am sure there were more Grundisburgh folk out in the woods than there were at home.’
‘Looking for the golden calf,’ said the landlord of the Dog in a soft voice behind them, making them jump. ‘The reward for finding it and giving it to Sir Thomas is ten marks – two years’ pay for most people. But ten marks would not induce me to go out at night to hunt for the thing.’
‘And why is that?’ asked Michael.
The landlord crossed himself. ‘Because of Padfoot. Ten marks is no good to a dead man, and that is what anyone who sees the beast will be. I heard Deblunville died last night. I always said it was only a matter of time before he was laid in his grave after seeing Padfoot.’
Having made his point, he left them to their meal, talking in a low voice about the inevitability of Deblunville’s demise to the man with the pig who had been so vociferous at the debate.
‘The Barchester woman had badly infected eyes,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Stoate said the person he saw running from the church was rubbing his eyes.’
‘I see,’ said Michael, taking a large gulp of wine. ‘It was this crone who donned a cloak and killed Unwin in the church last week, was it? How silly of me not to have thought of that before!’
‘It might have been her,’ said Bartholomew, unruffled by Michael’s sarcasm. ‘Stoate and Norys both said they were unsure whether it was a man or a woman. Although she was very small and somewhat crooked – you would think one of them would have noticed that.’
‘And can you see this woman having the guile to wear a cloak – long, according to Stoate, but short according to Norys – to hide her wretched rags? She does not sound to me as though she has enough of her sanity left to take care of herself, let alone effect a crafty murder that has confounded the University of Cambridge’s Senior Proctor.’
‘Well, that proves it was not her, then,’ said Bartholomew dryly. ‘Far be it for old women to get the better of the University of Cambridge’s Senior Proctor. But at least we now know who owns the abandoned skirt and shoe we found there.’
He was eating a slice of tart when there was a deafening roar that shook the building to its foundations. Fragments of plaster drifted down from the ceiling, and the cat that had been stalking mice in the rushes flattened its ears with a yowl and tore from the room. Bartholomew and Michael looked at each other in confusion.
‘What was that?’ asked Michael, picking a flake of wood out of his stew and flicking it on to the floor. ‘It sounded as though one of the bells has fallen out of the church tower.’
Wiping his hands on his apron, the landlord went to find out, accompanied by the man with the pig. Excited shouts and running footsteps suggested that others were curious, too, but Bartholomew could see nothing through the window to warrant abandoning his meal. He had barely sat down again when Cynric burst into the room.
‘The Half Moon!’ he cried, reaching out to haul Bartholomew from his seat. ‘It has gone!’
‘Gone where?’ asked Michael, not pleased at being interrupted while he was feeding.
‘Gone!’ yelled Cynric frantically. ‘Gone completely!’
With trepidation, Bartholomew followed him out of the tavern and down The Street. Cynric was right. The Half Moon was nothing but a vast pile of burning rubble and teetering walls. A thick pall of black smoke poured from the twisted beams, and timbers and pieces of glass crunched under the feet of the milling spectators. The thatch was ablaze with flames that licked this way and that, sending showers of sparks high into the sky and, even as Bartholomew watched, one precarious wall collapsed with a tearing scream in a cloud of dust.
The villagers gasped in horror and started back as sharp snaps heralded pieces of plaster and burning timber being catapulted across the ground toward them. One man shrieked as his cotte began to smoulder. With great presence of mind, Stoate bundled him to the stream and pushed him in before the flames could take hold. But Bartholomew saw only the burning building.
‘Alcote!’ he whispered in shock. ‘Roger Alcote was in there.’
Eltisley was surrounded by sympathetic customers, his face as white as snow as he gazed at the inferno that had been his tavern. Tuddenham leaned heavily on Hamon’s arm as he surveyed the mess with a stunned expression, while Hamon’s glazed eyes showed that he had not even begun to comprehend what had happened to Grundisburgh’s largest and most prestigious tavern. Isilia stood next to them, as numbed by the spectacle as were her menfolk, while Dame Eva had both frail arms wrapped around the weeping Mistress Eltisley. As Bartholomew shouldered his way through the crowd, the landlord gaped at him and his eyes filled with tears.
‘Thank God!’ he said shakily. ‘I thought you were inside changing your clothes.’
‘Where is Alcote?’ asked Bartholomew urgently.
‘I do not know,’ said Eltisley in a whisper. ‘I was in the kitchen cooking your meal when this happened. I only escaped because the force of the blast blew me outside.’
‘You mean the tavern exploded?’ asked Hamon in bewilderment. He came toward them, dragging his shocked uncle with him. ‘How can that have happened?’
‘Gasses,’ announced Walter Wauncy, in his sepulchral voice. ‘I have heard of this happening in other places. Malignant gasses build up and then give vent to their fury – like volcanoes.’