‘Perhaps it is enough that she is exhumed.’ Michael wiped his sweaty face with his sleeve. ‘Some of the covens that have sprung up of late have devised some very sinister rites. I shall have to order my beadles to pay additional attention to graveyards from now on.’
‘It must be the weather,’ said Langelee. ‘I have never known such heat in June, and it is sending folk mad – encouraging them to leave the Church, join cadres, despoil graves at midnight …’
‘What shall we do with her?’ asked Cynric, indicating Margery with a nod of his head. ‘Shall we have another grand requiem, and lay her to rest a second time?’
‘That would cost a fortune,’ said Langelee. ‘And the College cannot afford it. Besides, the fewer people who see her like this, the better. We shall rebury her now, and say a mass later. I do not suppose you know any incantations to keep her in the ground this time, do you, Brother?’
‘I do,’ said Cynric brightly. ‘Or rather, Mother Valeria does. Shall I buy one for you? She is a very powerful witch, so I hope you appreciate my courage in offering to step into her lair.’
Langelee handed him some coins, ignoring the monk’s grimace of disapproval. ‘Make sure she provides you with a good one, then. We do not want to be doing this again tomorrow.’
When Margery was back in the earth, Bartholomew followed Michael into the church, leaving Cynric to pat the grave-soil into place and Langelee to return to the College. It was still not fully light, so the building was dark and shadowy. It was also pleasantly cool, and Bartholomew breathed in deeply, relishing the familiar scent of incense, old plaster and dry rot. Then he made for the south porch, where a bucket of water was always kept. He grabbed the brush that was used for scouring flagstones, and began to scrub his hands, wondering whether they would ever feel clean again.
‘Did you notice the door was unlocked when we came in?’ asked Michael irritably. ‘How many more times must I tell everyone to be careful? Do they want our church burgled?’
‘I am sorry, Brother,’ said Bartholomew, glancing up at him. ‘That was me. Clippesby offered to say another mass for Father Thomas, and afterwards, I must have forgotten …’
‘It is time you stopped feeling guilty about Thomas’s death,’ said Michael firmly. ‘We all make mistakes, and you cannot be expected to save every patient. He was not a–’
He stopped speaking when the door clanked, and someone walked in. It was their colleague, Father William, a burly friar with unruly brown hair that sprouted around a badly maintained tonsure, and a habit so deeply engrained with filth that his students swore it was the vilest garment in Christendom. William nodded to Michael, but ignored the physician, making the point that he was not yet ready to forgive or forget what had happened to his fellow Franciscan. He busied himself about the church, while Bartholomew finished washing his hands and Michael went to prepare for the mass. After a while, Bartholomew went outside, uncomfortable with the reproachful looks being aimed in his direction by the dour friar.
He sat on a tombstone, feeling sweat trickle down his back, and wondered why the weather had turned so hot. Did it presage another wave of the plague? He sincerely hoped not, recalling how useless traditional medicine had proved to be. There had been some survivors – himself among them – but their recovery had had nothing to do with anything he had done. His failures made him think of Thomas again, and he wondered whether he would ever be able to forgive himself for prescribing a ‘remedy’ that had killed the man. He closed his eyes, feeling weariness wash over him, but they snapped open when a howl echoed from the church.
He leapt to his feet and raced inside. William was standing over the baptismal font, pointing a finger that shook with rage and indignation. Flies buzzed in the air around him. Bartholomew ran towards him, then wrinkled his nose in disgust when he saw what had agitated the friar. There was a pool of congealing blood in the font.
Quickly, before their colleagues arrived for morning prayers, Bartholomew washed the font, while William scattered holy water around the desecrated area. The friar was livid, not just about the sacrilege, but about the fact that he had risen early to say prayers for Thomas, and resented being diverted from his original purpose. Bartholomew tuned out his diatribe, not wanting to hear yet more recriminations about the man he had killed. Fortunately, it was not long before Langelee arrived, bringing with him the remaining Fellows, a gaggle of commoners – men who were granted bed and board in exchange for light teaching duties – and the College’s students.
William gabbled through the mass at a furious lick that had the students grinning in appreciation. Their delight did not last long, however: it soon became apparent that he was rushing because he was scheduled to give the Saturday Sermon, and wanted as much time as possible in which to hold forth. Langelee had inaugurated the Saturday Sermons for two reasons. First, they provided the student-priests in his College with an opportunity to hone their preaching skills before they were assigned parishes of their own, and second, they allowed him to keep an eye on the fifty or so lively young men under his care on a day when they should have had a lot of free time.
Unfortunately, the Sermons were deeply unpopular with everyone. The students detested being cooped up inside, while the senior scholars objected to having the mumbled speeches of novices inflicted on them. And there was another problem, too. Michaelhouse had seven Fellows, five of whom were in religious Orders. The clerics also demanded a chance to pontificate in front of an audience that could not escape or interrupt, and Langelee could only refuse them for so long. And that Saturday, with the sun beginning to blaze down from a cloudless sky and the streets baked as hard as fired clay, it was William’s turn. When the mass was over, the Master stepped forward with a marked lack of enthusiasm, made a few ambiguous remarks about the quality of the day’s speaker, and indicated with a nod that William could begin.
Flattered by the Master’s introduction – although Bartholomew would not have been pleased to hear himself described as ‘a man of probable wisdom’ – William took a deep breath and drew himself up to his full height. His colleagues braced themselves. The Franciscan had always held strong opinions, but they had grown even more radical over the past few weeks, and he had become obsessed by the belief that the University was full of heretics – and by ‘heretic’ he meant anyone who disagreed with him. Because few scholars shared his dogmatic views, he was convinced the studium generale in the Fens was bursting at the seams with heathens, and considered it his personal duty to roust them all out.
‘Heretics,’ he boomed. The volume of his yell made several Fellows jump, which led to an outbreak of sniggering among the students. Michael silenced them with a glare; and when the Senior Proctor glared, wise lads hastened to behave themselves.
‘Not heretics again,’ groaned Langelee. ‘He ranted about them last time, too.’
‘It is all he talks about these days,’ agreed Michael. ‘And the town’s current fascination with witchery is not helping, either – it is making him worse than ever.’
‘The familiars of Satan swagger in our midst, and today I shall tell you about them,’ promised William, a little threateningly.
‘Here we go,’ sighed Langelee. He spoke loudly enough to be audible to most of the gathering, although William was too engrossed in his own tirade to notice.
‘They call themselves Dominicans,’ William declared, delivering the last word in a sibilant hiss that gave it a distinctly sinister timbre. He wagged his forefinger at the assembled scholars. ‘And do you know why we know them as Black Friars? Because black is the Devil’s favourite colour, and they wear it to honour him.’